The protracted struggle between science and the classics appears to be drawing to a close, with victory about to perch on the banner of science, as a perusal of almost any university or college catalogue shows. While a limited knowledge of both Greek and Latin is important for the correct use of our own language, the amount till recently required, in my judgment, has been absurdly out of proportion to the intrinsic value of these branches, or perhaps more correctly roots, of study. The classics have been thoroughly and painfully threshed out, and it seems impossible that anything new can be unearthed. We may equal the performances of the past, but there is no opportunity to surpass them or produce anything original. Even the much-vaunted "mental training" argument is beginning to pall; for would not anything equally

     Jupiter -- the magnificent planet with a diameter of 86,500 miles, having 119 times the surface and 1,300 times the volume of the earth -- lay beneath them.

     They had often seen it in the terrestrial sky, emitting its strong, steady ray, and had thought of that far-away planet, about which till recently so little had been known, and a burning desire had possessed them to go to it and explore its mysteries. Now, thanks to apergy, the force whose existence the ancients suspected, but of which they knew so little, all things were possible.

     Ayrault manipulated the silk-covered glass handles, and the Callisto moved on slowly in comparison

     "Is it not strange," said Dr. Cortlandt, "that though it has been known for over a century that bodies charged with unlike electricities attract one another, and those charged with like repel, no one thought of utilizing the counterpart of gravitation? In the nineteenth century, savants and Indian jugglers performed experiments with their disciples and masses of inert matter, by causing them to remain without visible support at some distance from the ground; and while many of these, of course, were quacks, some were on the right track, though they did not push their research."

     President Bearwarden and Ayrault assented. They were steering for an apparently hard part of the planet's surface, about a degree and a half north of its equator.

     Since Jupiter's axis is almost at right angles to the plane of its orbit," said the doctor, "being inclined only about one degree and a half, instead of twenty-three and a half, as was the earth's till nearly so recently, it will be possible for us to have any climate we wish, from constantly warm at the equator to constantly cool or cold as we approach the poles, without being troubled by extremes of winter and summer."

     Until the Callisto entered the planet's atmosphere, its five moons appeared like silver shields against the black sky, but now things were looking more terrestrial, and they began to feel at home. Bearwarden put down his note-book, and Ayrault returned a photograph to his pocket, while all three gazed at their new abode. Beneath them was a vast continent variegated by chains of lakes and rivers stretching away in all directions except toward the equator, where lay a placid ocean as far as their telescopes could pierce. To the eastward were towering and massive mountains, and along the southern border of the continent smoking volcanoes, while toward the west they saw forests, gently rolling plains, and table-lands that would have satisfied a poet or

     "Any inhabitants we may find here have so much land at their disposal that they will not need to drain swamps on account of pressure of population for some time," put in the doctor.

     "I hope we may find some four-legged inhabitants," said Ayrault, thinking of their explosive magazine rifles. "If Jupiter is passing through its Jurassic or Mesozoic period, there must be any amount of some kind of game." Just then a quiver shook the Callisto, and glancing to the right they noticed one of the volcanoes in violent eruption. Smoke filled the air in clouds, hot stones and then floods of lava poured from the crater, while even the walls of the hermetically sealed Callisto could not arrest the thunderous crashes that made the interior of the car resound.

     "Had we not better move on?" said Bearwarden, and accordingly they went toward the woods they had first seen. Finding a firm strip of land between the forest and an arm of the sea, they gently

     "I fancy," said Dr. Cortlandt, "we had better wait now till we become accustomed to this pressure. I do not believe it will go much higher, for the window made but little resistance when we shut it."

     Finding they were not inconvenienced by a pressure but little greater than that of a deep coal-mine, they again opened the port, whereupon their barometer showed a further rise to forty-two, and then remained stationary. Finding also that the chemical composition of the air suited them, and that they had no difficulty in breathing, the pressure being the same as that sustained by a diver in fourteen feet of water, they opened a door and emerged. They knew fairly well what to expect, and were not disturbed by their new conditions. Though they had apparently

     Bearwarden and Ayrault shouldered their rifles, while Dr. Cortlandt took a repeating shot-gun with No. 4 shot, and, having also some hunting-knives and a sextant, all three set out in a northwesterly direction.

     "Jupiter is evidently passing through a Carboniferous or Devonian period such as existed on earth, though, if consistent with its size, it should be on a vastly larger scale," said the doctor. "I never believed in the theory," he continued, "that the larger the planet the smaller should be its inhabitants, and always considered it a makeshift, put forward in the absence of definite knowledge, the idea being apparently that the weight of very large creatures would be too great for their strength. Of the fact that mastodons and creatures far larger than any now living on earth existed there, we have absolute proof, though gravitation must have been practically the same then as now."

     Just here they came upon a number of huge bones, evidently the remains of some saurian, and many times the size of a grown crocodile. On

     "We expected to find all kinds of reptiles and birds," exclaimed the doctor. "But I do not know how we should class those creatures. They seem to have pneumatic feet and legs, for their motion was certainly not produced like that of frogs."

     When the party came up with them the heads again began to swell.

     "I will perforate the air-chamber of one," said Col. Bearwarden, withdrawing the explosive cartridge from the barrel of his rifle and substituting one with a solid ball. "This will doubtless disable one so that we can examine it."

     Just as they were about to rise, he shot the largest through the neck. All but the wounded one, soared off, while Bearwarden, Ayrault, and Cortlandt approached to examine it more closely.

     "You see," said Cortlandt, "this vertebrate -- for that is as definitely as we can yet describe it -- forces a great pressure of air into its head and neck, which, by the action of valves, it must allow to rush into its very rudimentary lower extremities, distending them with such violence that the body is shot upward and forward. You may have noticed the tightly inflated portion underneath as they left the ground."

     While speaking he had moved rather near, when suddenly a partially concealed mouth opened, showing the unmistakable tongue and fangs of a serpent. It emitted a hissing sound, and the small eyes gleamed maliciously.

     "Do you believe it is a poisonous species?" asked Ayrault.

     "I suspect it is," replied the doctor; "for, though it is doubtless able to leap with great accuracy upon its prey, we saw it took some time to recharge the upper air-chamber, so that, were it not armed with poison glands, it would fall an easy victim to its more

     "As it will be unable to spring for some time," said Bearwarden, " we might as well save it the disappointment of trying," and, snapping the used shell from his rifle, he fired an explosive ball into the reptile, whereupon about half the body disappeared, while a sickening odour arose. Although the sun was still far above the horizon, the rapidity with which it was descending showed that the short night of less than five hours would soon be upon them; and though short it might be very dark, for they were in the tropics, and the sun, going down perpendicularly, must also pass completely around the globe, instead of, as in northern latitudes on earth in summer, approaching the horizon obliquely, and not going far below it. A slight and diffused sound here seemed to rise from the ground all about them, for which they could not account. Presently it became louder, and as the sun touched the horizon, it poured forth in prolonged strains. The large trumpet-shaped lilies, reeds, and heliotropes seemed fairly to throb as they raised their anthem to the sky and the setting sun, while the

     "This is the most marvellous development of Nature I have seen, for its wonderful divergence from, and yet analogy to, what takes place on earth. You know our flowers offer honey, as it were, as bait to insects, that in eating or collecting it they may catch the pollen on their legs and so carry it to other flowers, perhaps of the opposite sex. Here flowers evidently appeal to the sense of hearing instead of taste, and make use of birds, of which there are enormous numbers, instead of winged insects, of which I have seen none, one being perhaps the natural result of the other. The flowers have become singers by long practice, or else, those that were most musical having had the best chance to reproduce, we have a neat illustration of the `survival of the fittest.' The sound is doubtless produced by a shrinking of the fibres as the sun withdraws its heat, in which case we may expect another song at

     Searching for a camping-place in which to pass the coming hours, they saw lights flitting about like will-o'-the-wisps, but brighter and intermittent.

     "They seem to be as bright as sixteen-candle-power lamps, but the light is yellower, and appears to emanate from a comparatively large surface, certainly nine or ten inches square," said the doctor.

     They soon gave up the chase, however, for the lights were continually moving and frequently went out. While groping in the growing darkness, they came upon a brown object about the size of a small dog and close to the ground. It flew off with a humming insect sound, and as it did so it showed the brilliant phosphorescent glow they had observed.

     "That is a good-sized fire-fly," said Bearwarden. "Evidently the insects here are on the same scale as everything else. They are like the fire-flies in Cuba, which the Cubans are said to put into a glass box and get light enough from to read by. Here they would need only one, if it could be induced to give its light continuously."

     Having found an open space on high ground,

     "Twenty minutes past four," said he, " which would correspond to about a quarter to eleven on earth. As the sun rises at half-past seven, it will be dark about three hours, for the time between dawn and daylight will, of course, be as short as that we have just experienced between sunset and night."

     "If we stay here long," said the doctor, "I suppose we shall become accustomed, like sailors, to taking our four, or in this case five, hours on duty, and five hours off."

     "Or," added Ayrault, "we can sleep ten consecutive hours and take the next ten for exploring and hunting, having the sun for one half the time and the moons for the other."

     Bearwarden and Cortlandt now rolled themselves in their blankets and were soon asleep, while Ayrault, whose turn it was to watch till the moons rose -- for they had not yet enough confidence in their new domain to sleep in darkness simultaneously -- leaned his

     "Come in!" sounded a voice, as Dr. Cortlandt and Dick Ayrault tapped at the door of the President of the Terrestrial Axis Straightening Company's private office on the morning of the 21st of June, A. D. 2000. Col. Bearwarden sat at his capacious desk, the shadows passing over his face as April clouds flit across the sun. He was a handsome man, and young for the important post he filled -- being scarcely forty -- a graduate of West Point, with great executive ability, and a wonderful engineer. "Sit down, chappies," said he; "we have still a half hour before I begin to read the report I am to make to the stockholders and representatives of all the governments, which is now ready. I know you smoke," passing a box of Havanas to the professor.

     Prof. Cortlandt, LL. D., United States Government

     "Knowing the way you carry things in your mind, and the difficulty of rattling you," said Cortlandt, "we have dropped in on our way to hear the speech that I would not miss for a fortune. Let us know if we bother you."

     "Impossible, dear boy," replied the president genially. "Since I survived your official investigations, I think I deserve some of your attention informally."

     "Here are my final examinations," said Cortlandt, handing Bearwarden a roll of papers. "I have been over all your figures, and testify to their accuracy in the appendix I have added."

     So they sat and chatted about the enterprise that interested Cortlandt and Ayrault almost as much as Bearwarden himself. As the clock struck eleven, the president of the company put on his hat, and, saying au revoir to his friends, crossed the street to the Opera House, in which he was to read a report that would be copied in all the great journals and heard over thousands of miles of wire in every part of the globe. When he arrived, the vast building was already filled with a distinguished company, representing the greatest intelligence, wealth, and powers of the world. Bearwarden went in by the stage entrance, exchanging greetings as he did so with officers of the company and directors who had come to hear him. Cortlandt and Ayrault entered by the regular door, the former going to the Government representatives' box, the latter to join his fiancee, Sylvia Preston, who was there with her mother. Bearwarden had a roll of manuscript at hand, but so well did he know his speech that he scarcely glanced at it. After being introduced by the chairman of the meeting, and seeing that his audience was all attention, he began, holding himself erect, his clear, powerful voice making every part of the building ring.

     "To the Bondholders and Stockholders of the Terrestrial Axis Straightening Company and Representatives of Earthly Governments.

     "GENTLEMEN: You know that the objects of this company are, to straighten the axis of the earth, to combine the extreme heat of summer with the intense cold of winter and produce a uniform temperature for each degree of latitude the year round. At present the earth's axis -- that is, the line passing through its centre and the two poles -- is inclined to the ecliptic about twenty-three and a half degrees. Our summer is produced by the northern hemisphere's leaning at that angle towards the sun, and our winter by its turning that much from it. In one case the sun's rays are caused to shine more perpendicularly, and in the other more obliquely. This

     "Venus is made still more difficult of habitation by the fact that she rotates on her axis in the same time that she revolves about the sun, in the same way that the moon does about the earth, so that one side must be perpetually frozen while the other is parched.

     "In Uranus we see the axis tilted still further, so that the arctic circle descends to the equator. The most varied climate must therefore prevail during its year, whose length exceeds eighty-one of ours.

     The axis of Mars is inclined about twenty-eight

     "In Jupiter we have an illustration of a planet whose axis is almost at right angles to the plane of its orbit, being inclined but about a degree and a half. The hypothetical inhabitants of this majestic planet must therefore have perpetual summer at the equator, eternal winter at the poles, and in the temperate regions everlasting spring. On account of the straightness of the axis, however, even the polar inhabitants -- if there are any -- are not oppressed by a six months' night, for all except those at the very pole have a sunrise and a sunset every ten hours -- the exact day being nine hours, fifty five minutes, and twenty-eight seconds. The warmth of the tropics is also tempered by the high winds that must result from the rapid whirl on its axis, every object at the equator being carried around by this at the rate of 27,600 miles an hour, or over three thousand miles farther than the earth's equator moves in twenty-four hours.

     The inclination of the axis of our own planet has

     "It is not to be supposed that the inclining of the axes of Jupiter, Venus, the Earth, and the other planets, is now fixed; in some cases it is known to be changing. As long ago as 1890, Major-Gen. A. W. Drayson, of the British Army, showed, in a work entitled Untrodden Ground in Astronomy and Geology, that, as a result of the second rotation of the earth, the inclination of its axis was changing, it having been 23^o 28' 23" on January 1, 1750, 23^o 27' 55.3" on January 1, 1800, and 23^o 27' 30.9" on January 1, 1850; and by calculation one hundred and ten years ago showed that in 1900 (one hundred years ago) it would be 23^o 27' 08.8". This natural straightening is, of course, going on, and we are

     "The way to accomplish this is to increase the weight of the pole leaving the sun, by increasing the amount of material there for the sun to attract, and to lighten the pole approaching or turning towards the sun, by removing some heavy substance from it, and putting it preferably at the opposite pole. This shifting of ballast is most easily accomplished, as

     "From Commander Fillmore, of the Arctic Shade and the Committee on Bulkheads and Dams, I have just received the following by cable telephone: `The Arctic Ocean is now in condition to be pumped out in summer and to have its average depth increased one hundred feet by the dams in winter. We have already fifty million square yards of windmill turbine surface in position and ready to move. The cables bringing us currents from the dynamos at Niagara Falls are connected with our motors, and those from the tidal dynamos at the Bay of Fundy will be in contact when this reaches you, at which moment the pumps will begin. In several of the landlocked gulfs and bays our system of confining is so complete, that the surface of the water can be raised two hundred feet above sea-level. The polar bears will soon have to use artificial ice. Perhaps the cheers now ringing without may reach you over the telephone.'"

     The audience became greatly interested, and when the end of the telephone was applied to a microphone the room fairly rang with exultant cheers, and those looking through a kintograph (visual telegraph) terminating in a camera obscura on the shores of Baffin Bay were able to see engineers and workmen waving and throwing up their caps and falling into one another's arms in ecstasies of delight. When the excitement subsided, the president continued:

     "Chairman Wetmore, of the Committee on Excavations and Embankments in Wilkesland and the Antarctic Continent, reports: `Two hundred and fifty thousand square miles are now hollowed out and enclosed sufficiently to hold water to an average depth of four hundred feet. Every summer, when the basin is allowed to drain, we can, if necessary, extend our reservoir, and shall have the best season of the year for doing work until the earth has permanent spring. Though we have comparatively little water or tidal power, the earth's crust is so thin at this latitude, on account of the flattening, that by sinking our tubular boilers and pipes to a depth of a few thousand feet we have secured so terrific a volume

     "`We shall be able to find use for much of the potential energy of the water in the reservoir when we allow it to escape in June, in melting some of the accumulated polar ice-cap, thereby decreasing still further the weight of this pole, in lighting and warming ourselves until we get the sun's light and heat, in extending the excavations, and in charging the storage batteries of the ships at this end of the line. Everything will be ready when you signal "Raise water."'"

     "Let me add parenthetically," said Bearwarden, "that this means of obtaining power by steam boilers sunk to a great depth is much to be commended; for, though the amount of heat we can withdraw is too small to have much effect, the farther towards

     "You see," the president continued, "the storage capacity at the south pole is not quite as great as at the north, because it is more difficult to excavate a basin than to close the exits of one that already exists, which is what we have done in the arctic. The work is also not so nearly complete, since it will not be necessary to use the southern reservoir for storing weight for six months, or until the south pole, which is now at its maximum declination from the sun, is turned towards it and begins to move away; then, by increasing the amount of matter there, and at the same time lightening the north pole, and reversing the process every six months, we decrease the speed at which the departing pole leaves the sun and at which the approaching pole advances. The north pole, we see, will be a somewhat more powerful lever than the south for working the globe to a straight position, but we may be sure that the latter, in connection with the former, will be able to hold up its end."

     [The building here fairly shook with applause, so that, had the arctic workers used the microphone, they might have heard in the enthusiastic uproar a good counterpart of their own period.]

     "I only regret," the president continued, "that when we began this work the most marvellous force yet discovered -- apergy -- was not sufficiently understood to be utilized, for it would have eased our labours to the point of almost eliminating them. But we have this consolation: it was in connection with our work that its applicability was discovered, so that had we and all others postponed our great undertaking on the pretext of waiting for a new force, apergy might have continued to lie dormant for centuries. With this force, obtained by simply blending negative and positive electricity with electricity of the third element or state, and charging a body sufficiently with this fluid, gravitation is millifled or partly reversed, and the earth repels the body with the same or greater power than that with which it still attracts or attracted it, so that it may be suspended or caused to move away into space. Sic itur ad astra, we may say. With this force and everlasting spring before us, what may we not achieve? We

     "No one need henceforth be troubled by sudden change, and every man can have perpetually the climate he desires. Northern Europe will again luxuriate in a climate that favoured the elephants that roamed in northern Asia and Switzerland. To produce these animals and the food they need, it is not necessary to have great heat, but merely to prevent great cold, half the summer's sun being absorbed in melting the winter's accumulation of ice.

     "When the axis has reached a point at which it inclines but about twelve degrees, it will become

     "Ocean currents, being the result of the prevailing winds, which will be more regular than at present, can be counted upon to continue practically as they are. It may not be plain to you why the trade winds do not blow towards the equator due south and north, since the equator has much the same effect on air that a stove has in the centre of a room, causing an ascending current towards the ceiling, which moves off in straight lines in all directions on reaching it, its place being taken by cold currents moving in opposite directions along the floor. Picture to yourselves the ascending currents at the equator

     Appended to the address was the report of the Government Examining Committee, which ran: "We have critically examined the Terrestrial Axis Straightening Company's figures and calculations, also its statements involving natural philosophy, physics, and astronomy, all of which we find correct, and hereby approve. [Signed] "For the Committee:
"HENRY CHELMSFORD CORTLANDT,
"Chairman."

     The Board of Directors having ratified the acts of its officers, and passed congratulatory resolutions, the meeting adjourned sine die.

     Prof. Cortlandt, preparing a history of the times at the beginning of the great terrestrial and astronomical change, wrote as follows: "This period -- A.D. 2000 -- is by far the most wonderful the world has as yet seen. The advance in scientific knowledge and attainment within the memory, of the present generation has been so stupendous that it completely overshadows all that has preceded. All times in history and all periods of the world have been remarkable for some distinctive or characteristic trait. The feature of the period of Louis XIV was the splendour of the court and the centralization of power in Paris. The year 1789 marked the decline of the power of courts and the evolution of government by the people. So, by the spread of republican ideas

     "With increased knowledge we are constantly coming to realize how little we really know, and are also continually finding manifestations of forces that at first seem like exceptions to established laws. This is, of course, brought about by the modifying influence of some other natural law, though many of these we have not yet discovered.

     "Electricity in its varied forms does all work, having superseded animal and manual labour in everything, and man has only to direct. The greatest ingenuity next to finding new uses for this almost omnipotent fluid has been displayed in inducing the forces of Nature, and even the sun, to produce it. Before describing the features of this perfection of civilization, let us review the steps by which society and the political world reached their present state.

     "At the close of the Franco -- Prussian War, in 1871, Continental Europe entered upon the condition of an armed camp, which lasted for nearly half a century. The primary cause of this was the mutual dislike and jealousy of France and Germany,

     "These tremendous sacrifices for armaments, both on land and water, had far-reaching results, and, as we see it now, were clouds with silver linings. The demand for hardened steel projectiles, nickel-steel plates, and light and almost unbreakable machinery, was a great incentive to improvement in metallurgy while the necessity for compact and safely carried ammunition greatly stimulated chemical research, and led to the discovery of explosives whose powers no obstacle can resist, and incidentally to other more useful things.

     "Further mechanical and scientific progress, however, such as flying machines provided with these high explosives, and asphyxiating bombs containing compressed gas that could be fired from guns or dropped from the air, intervened. The former would have laid every city in the dust, and the latter might have almost exterminated the race. These discoveries providentially prevented hostilities, so that the `Great War,' so long expected, never came, and the rival nations had their pains for nothing, or, rather, for others than themselves.

     "Let us now examine the political and ethnological results. Hundreds of thousands, of the flower of Continental Europe were killed by overwork and short rations, and millions of desirable and often -- unfortunately for us -- undesirable people were driven to emigration, nearly all of whom came to English-speaking territory, greatly increasing our productiveness and power. As, we have seen, the jealousy of the Continental powers for one another effectually prevented their extending their influence or protectorates to other continents, which jealousy was considerably aided by the small but destructive wars that did take place. High

     "This has given the English-speakers, especially the United States, a free hand, rendering enforcement of the Monroe doctrine easy, and started English a long way towards becoming the universal language, while all formerly unoccupied land is now owned by those speaking it.

     "At the close of our civil war, in 1865, we had but 3,000,000 square miles, and a population of 34,000,000. The country staggered beneath a colossal debt of over $4,000,000,000, had an expensive but essentially perishable navy, and there was an ominous feeling between the sections. The purchase of Alaska in 1867, by which we added over half a million square miles to our territory, marked the resumption of the forward march of the United States. Twenty-five years later, at the presidential

     "Gradually the different States of Canada -- or provinces, as they were then called -- came to realize that their future would be far grander and more glorious in union with the United States than separated from it; and also that their sympathy was far stronger for their nearest neighbours than for any one else. One by one these Northern States made known their desire for consolidation with the Union, retaining complete control of their local affairs, as have the older States. They were gladly welcomed by our Government and people, and possible rivals became the best of friends. Preceding and also following this, the States of Mexico, Central America,

     "Thus, in the first place, by the encouragement of our people, and latterly, apparently, by its own volition, the Union has increased enormously in power, till it now embraces 10,000,000 square miles, and has a free and enlightened population of 300,000,000. Though the Union established by Washington and his contemporaries has attained such tremendous proportions, its growth is by no means finished; and as a result of modern improvements, it is less of a journey now to go from Alaska to the Orinoco than it was for the Father of his Country to travel from New York or Philadelphia to the site of the city named in his honour.

     "Adequate and really rapid transportation facilities

     "Let us now glance at the times as they are, and see how the business of life is transacted. Manhattan Island has something over 2,500,000 inhabitants, and is surrounded by a belt of population, several miles wide, of 12,000,000 more, of which it is the focus, so that the entire city contains more than 14,500,000 souls. The several hundred square miles of land and water forming greater New York are perfectly united by numerous bridges, tunnels, and electric ferries, while the city's great natural advantages have been enhanced and beautified by every ingenious device. No main avenue in the newer sections is less than two hundred feet wide, containing shade and fruit trees, a bridle-path, broad sidewalks, and open spaces for carriages and bicycles.

     "The hollow masts of our ships -- to glance at another phase en passant -- carry windmills instead of sails, through which the wind performs the work, of storing a great part of the energy required to run them at sea, while they are discharging or loading cargo in port; and it can, of course, work to better advantage while they are stationary than when they are running before it. These turbines are made entirely of light metal, and fold when not in use, so that only the frames are visible. Sometimes these also fold and are housed, or wholly disappear within the mast. Steam-boilers are also placed at the foci of huge concave mirrors, often a hundred feet in diameter, the required heat being supplied by the sun, without smoke, instead of by bulky and dirty coal. This discovery gave commercial value to Sahara and other tropical deserts, which are now desirable for mill-sites and for generating power, on account of the directness with which they receive the sun's

     "The rabbits in Australia, and the far more objectionable poisonous snakes in South America and India, have been exterminated by the capture of a few dozen of the creatures in the infested districts, their inoculation with the virus similar to the murus tiphi, tuberculosis or any other contagious-germ complaint

     "We have microbe tests that show us as unmistakably whether the germs of any particular disease -- like malaria, typhoid, or scarlet fever -- are present in the air, as litmus-paper shows alkalinity of a solution. We also inoculate as a preventive against

     "The medicinal properties of all articles of food are so well understood also, that most cures are brought about simply by dieting. This, reminds me of the mistakes perpetrated on a friend of mine who called in Dr. Grave-Powders, one of the old-school physicians, to be treated for insomnia and dyspepsia. This old numskull restricted his diet, gave him huge doses of medicine, and decided most learnedly that he was daily growing worse. Concluding that he had but a short time to live, my friend threw away the nauseating medicines, ate whatever he had a natural desire for, and was soon as well as ever -- the obvious moral of which is, that we can get whatever treatment we need most beneficially from our food. Our physicians are most serious and thoughtful men. They never claim to be infallible, but study scientifically to increase their knowledge and improve the methods of treatment. As a result of this, fresh air, regular exercise for both sexes, with better conditions, and the preservation of the lives of children that formerly died by thousands from preventable causes, the physique, especially of women, is wonder

     "Our social structure, to be brief, is based on science, or the conservation of energy, as the Greek philosophers predicted. It was known to them that a certain amount of power would produce only a certain amount of work -- that is, the weight of a clock in descending or a spring in uncoiling returns theoretically the amount of work expended in raising or coiling it, and in no possible way can it do more. In practice, on account of friction, etc., we know it does less. This law, being invariable, of course limits us, as it did Archimedes and Pythagoras; we have simply utilized sources of power that their clumsy workmen allowed to escape. Of the four principal sources -- food, fuel, wind, and tide -- including harnessed waterfalls, the last two do by far the most work. Much of the electrical energy in every thunderstorm is also captured and condensed in our capacious storage batteries, as natural hygeia in the form of rain was and is still caught in our country cisterns. Every exposed place is crowned by a cluster of huge windmills that lift water to some pond or reservoir placed as high as possible. Every

     "Another form is the magnetic railway, on which the cars are wedge-shaped at both ends, and moved by huge magnets weighing four thousand tons each, placed fifty miles apart. On passing a magnet, the nature of the electricity charging a car is automatically changed from positive to negative, or vice versa, to that of the magnet just passed, so that it repels while the next attracts. The successive magnets are charged oppositely, the sections being divided halfway between by insulators, the nature of the electricity in each section being governed by the charge in the magnet. To prevent one kind of electricity from uniting with and neutralizing that in the next section by passing through the car at the moment of transit, there is a "dead stretch" of fifty yards with rails not charged at all between the sections. This change in the nature of the electricity is repeated automatically

     Magnetism being practically as instantaneous as gravitation, the only limitations to speed are the electrical pressure at the magnets, the resistance of the air, and the danger of the wheels bursting from centrifugal force. The first can seemingly be increased without limit; the atmospheric resistance is about to be reduced by running the cars hermetically sealed through a partial vacuum in a steel and toughened glass tube; while the third has been removed indefinitely by the use of galvanized aluminum, which bears about the same relation to ordinary aluminum that steel does to iron, and which has twice the tensile strength and but one third the weight of steel. In some cases the rails are made turned in, so that it would be impossible for a car to leave the track without the road-bed's being totally demolished; but in most cases this is found to be unnecessary, for no through line has a curve on its vast stretches with a radius of less than half a mile. Rails, one hundred and sixty pounds to the yard, are set in grooved steel ties, which in turn are held by a concrete road-bed consisting of broken stone and cement, making

     "In marine transportation we have two methods, one for freight and another for passengers. The old-fashioned deeply immersed ship has not changed radically from the steam and sailing vessels of the last century, except that electricity has superseded all other motive powers. Steamers gradually passed through the five hundred-, six hundred-, and seven hundred-foot-long class, with other dimensions in proportion, till their length exceeded one thousand feet. These were very fast ships, crossing the Atlantic in four and a half days, and were almost as steady as houses, in even the roughest weather.

     "Ships at this period of their development had also passed through the twin and triple screw stage to the quadruple, all four together developing one hundred and forty thousand indicated horse-power,

     "During the second decade of the twentieth century the engineers decided to try the plan of running half of a transatlantic liner's screws by electricity generated by the engines for driving the others while the ship was in port, this having been a success already on a smaller scale. For a time this plan gave great satisfaction, since it diminished the amount of coal to be carried and the consequent change of displacement at sea, and enabled the ship to be worked with a smaller number of men. The batteries could also, of course, be distributed along the entire length, and placed where space was least valuable.

     "The construction of such huge vessels called for much governmental river and harbour dredging, and a ship drawing thirty-five feet can now enter New York at any state of the tide. For ocean bars, the old system of taking the material out to

     The next improvement in sea travelling was the `marine spider.' As the name shows, this is built on the principle of an insect. It is well known that a body can be carried over the water much faster than through it. With this in mind, builders at first constructed light framework decks on large water-tight wheels or drums, having paddles on their circumferences to provide a hold on the water. These they caused to revolve by means

     Some passengers and express packages still cross

     "This change, like other labour-saving appliances, at first resulted in laying off a good many men, the least satisfactory being the first to go; but the increase in business was so great that the intelligent men were soon reemployed as officers at higher rates of pay and more interesting work than before,

     "With a view to facilitating interchange still further, our Government has gradually completed the double coast-line that Nature gave us in part. This was done by connecting islands separated from shore by navigable water, and leaving openings for ingress and exit but a few hundred yards wide. The breakwaters required to do this were built with cribbing of incorrodible metal, affixed to deeply driven metallic piles, and filled with stones along coasts where they were found in abundance or excess. This, while clearing many fields and improving them for cultivation, provided just the needed material; since irregular stones bind together firmly, and, while also insoluble, combine considerable bulk with weight. South of Hatteras, where stones are scarce, the sand dredged from parts of the channel was filled into the crib, the surface of which has a concave metallic cover, a trough of still water being often the best barrier against the passage of waves. This double coast-line has been a great benefit, and propelled vessels of moderate draught can range in

     "The rocks have been removed from all channels about New York and other commercial centres, while the shallow places have been dredged to a uniform depth. This diminishes the dangers of navigation and considerably decreases the speed with which the tides rush through. Where the obstructions consisted of reefs surrounded by deep water, their removal with explosives was easy, the shattered fragments being allowed to sink to the bottom and remain there beneath the danger line.

     "Many other great works have also been completed. The canals at Nicaragua have been in operation many years, it having been found best to have several sizes of locks, and to use the large ones only for the passage of large vessels. The improved Erie and Champlain Canals also enable ships four hundred feet long to reach New York from the Great Lakes via the Hudson River.

     "For flying, we have an aeroplane that came in when we devised a suitable motor power. This is

     The motors are so light that they develop two horse power for every pound of their weight; while, to keep the frames thin, the necessary power is obtained by terrific speed of the moving parts, as though a steam engine, to avoid great pressure in its cylinders, had a long stroke and ran at great piston speed, which, however, is no disadvantage to the rotary motion of the electric motor, there being no

     "To obviate the necessity of gearing to reduce the number of revolutions to those possible for a large screw, this member is made very small, and allowed to revolve three thousand times a minute, so that the requisite power is obtained with great simplicity of mechanism, which further decreases friction. The shafts, and even the wires connecting the batteries with the motors, are made large and hollow. Though the primary battery pure and simple, as the result of great recent advances in chemistry, seems to be again coming up, the best aeroplane batteries are still of the combination-storage type. These have been so perfected that eight ounces of battery yield one horse power for six hours, so that two pounds of battery will supply a horse power for twenty-four hours; a small fifty-horse-power aeroplane being therefore able to fly four days with a battery weight of but four hundred pounds.

     "Limestone and clarified acid are the principal parts of these batteries. It was known long ago that there was about as much imprisoned solar energy in

     "Common salt plays an important part in many of our chemical reactions. By combining it with limestone, and treating this with acid jelly, we also get good results on raising to the boiling-point.

     "However enjoyable the manly sport of yachting is on water, how vastly more interesting and fascinating it is for a man to have a yacht in which he can fly to Europe in one day, and with which the exploration of tropical Africa or the regions about the poles is mere child's play, while giving him so magnificent a bird's-eye view! Many seemingly insoluble problems are solved by the advent of these birds. Having as their halo the enforcement of peace, they have in truth taken us a long step towards heaven, and to the co-operation and higher civilization that followed we shall owe much of the success of the great experiment on Mother Earth now about to be tried.

     "Another change that came in with a rush upon the discovery of a battery with insignificant weight, compact form, and great capacity, was the substitution of electricity for animal power for the movement

     "The electric phaetons, as those for high speed

     "To recharge the batteries, which can be done in almost every town and village, two copper pins attached to insulated copper wires are shoved into smooth-bored holes. These drop out of themselves by fusing a small lead ribbon, owing to the increased resistance, when the acid in the batteries begins to `boil,' though there is, of course, but little heat in this, the function of charging being merely to bring about the condition in which part of the limestone can be

     "Light but powerful batteries and motors have also been fitted on bicycles, which can act either as auxiliaries for hill-climbing or in case of head wind, or they can propel the machine altogether.

     "Gradually the width of the streets became insufficient for the traffic, although the elimination of horses and the consequent increase in speed greatly augmented their carrying capacity, until recently a new system came in. The whole width of the avenues and streets in the business parts of the city, including the former sidewalks, is given up to wheel traffic, an iron ridge extending along the exact centre to compel vehicles to keep to the right. Strips of nickel painted white, and showing a bright phosphorescence at night, are let into the metal pavement flush with the surface, and run parallel to this ridge at distances of ten to fifteen feet, dividing

     "The policemen on duty also have instantaneous kodaks mounted on tripods, which show the position of any carriage at half-and quarter-second intervals, by which it is easy to ascertain the exact speed,

     "Of course, to make such high speed for ordinary carriages possible, a perfect pavement became a sine qua non. We have secured this by the half-inch sheet of steel spread over a carefully laid surface of asphalt, with but little bevel; and though this might be slippery for horses' feet, it never seriously affects our wheels. There being nothing harder than the rubber ties of comparatively light drays upon it -- for the heavy traffic is carried by electric railways under ground -- it will practically never wear out.

     "With the application of steel to the entire surface, car-tracks became unnecessary, ordinary wheels answering as well as those with flanges, so that no new tracks were laid, and finally the car companies tore up the existing ones, selling them in many instances to the municipalities as old iron. Our streets also need but little cleaning; neither is the surface continually indented, as the old cobble-stones and Belgian blocks were, by the pounding of the horses' feet, so that the substitution of electricity for

     "Scarcely a ton of coal comes to Manhattan Island or its vicinity in a year. Very little of it leaves the mines, at the mouths of which it is converted into electricity and sent to the points of consumption by wire, where it is employed for all uses to which fuel was put, and many others. Consequently there is no smoke, and the streets are not encumbered with coal-carts; the entire width being given up to carriages, etc. The ground floors in the business parts are used for large warehouses, trucks running in to load and unload. Pedestrians therefore have sidewalks level with the second story, consisting of glass floors let into aluminum frames, while all street crossings are made on bridges. Private houses have a front door opening on the sidewalk, and another on the ground level, so that ladies paying visits or leaving cards can do so in carriages. In business streets the second story is used for shops. In place of steel covering, country roads have a thick coating of cement and asphalt over a foundation of crushed stone, giving a capital surface, and have a width of thirty-three feet (two rods) in thinly settled

     We have been much aided in our material progress by the facility with which we obtain the metals. It was observed, some time ago, that when artesian and oil wells had reached a considerable depth, what appeared to be drops of lead and antimony came up with the stream. It finally occurred to a well-borer that if he could make his drill hard enough and get it down far enough, keeping it cool by solidified carbonic acid during the proceeding, he would

     "`Magnetic eyes' are of great use to miners and Civil engineers. These instruments are something like the mariner's compass, with the sensitiveness enormously increased by galvanic currents. The `eye,' as it were, sees what substances are underground, and at what distances. It also shows how many people are in an adjoining room -- through the magnetic properties of the iron in their blood --

     "Our political system remains with but little change. Each State has still two United States Senators, though the population represented by each representative has been greatly increased, so that the Senate has grown numerically much more than the House. It is the duty of each member of Congress to understand the conditions existing in every other member's State or district, and the country's interest always precedes that of party. We have a comprehensive examination system in the civil service, and every officeholder, except members of the Cabinet, retains his office while efficiently performing his duty, without regard to politics. The President can also be re-elected any number of times. The Cabinet members, as formerly, usually remain in office while he does, and appear regularly in Congress to defend their measures.

     "The really rapid transit lines in New York are underground, and have six tracks, two being used for

     "Photography has also made great strides, and there is now no difficulty in reproducing exactly the colours of the object taken.

     "Telephones have been so improved that one person can speak in his natural voice with another in any part of the globe, the wire that enables him to hear also showing him the face of the speaker though he be at the antipodes. All telephone wires being underground and kept by themselves, they are not interfered with by any high-tension electric-light or power wires, thunderstorms, or anything else.

     Rain-making is another subject removed from the uncertainties, and has become an absolute science. We produce clouds by explosions in the atmosphere's heights and by surface air forced by blowers through large pipes up the side of a mountain or natural elevation

     "Yet, until the earth's axis is straightened, we must be more or less dependent on the eccentricities of the weather, with extremes of heat and cold, droughts and floods, which last are of course largely the result of several months' moisture held on the ground in the form of snow, the congestion being relieved suddenly by the warm spring rains.

     "Medicine and surgery have kept pace with other improvements -- inoculation and antiseptics, as already seen, rendering most of the germ diseases and formerly dreaded epidemics impotent; while through the potency of electrical affinity we form wholesome food-products rapidly, instead of having to wait for their production by Nature's slow processes.

     "The metric system, now universal, superseded

     "English, as we have seen, is already the language of 600,000,000 people, and the number is constantly increasing through its adoption by the numerous races of India, where, even before the close of the last century, it was about as important as Latin during the greatness of Rome, and by the fact that the Spanish and Portuguese elements in Mexico and Central and South America show a constant tendency to die out, much as the population of Spain fell from 30,000,000 to 17,000,000 during the nineteenth century. As this goes on, in the Western hemisphere, the places left vacant are gradually filled by the more progressive Anglo-Saxons, so that it looks as if the study of ethnology in the future would be very simple.

     "The people with cultivation and leisure, whose number is increasing relatively to the population at each generation, spend much more of their year in the country than formerly, where they have large and well-cultivated country seats, parts of which are also preserved for game. This growing custom on the part of society, in addition to being of great ad

     "In astronomy we have also made tremendous strides. The old-fashioned double-convex lens used in telescopes became so heavy as its size grew, that it bent perceptibly from its own weight, when pointed at the zenith, distorting the vision; while when it was used upon a star near the horizon, though the glass on edge kept its shape, there was too much atmosphere between it and the observed object for successful study. Our recent telescopes have, therefore, concave plate-glass mirrors, twenty metres in diameter, like those used for converging the sun's rays in solar engines, but with curves more mathematically exact, which collect an immense amount of light and focus it on a sensitive plate or on the eye of the observer, whose back is turned to the object he is studying. An electrical field also plays an important part, the electricity being as great an aid to light as in the telephone it is to sound. With these placed generally on high mountain peaks, beyond the reach of clouds, we have enormously increased the number

     "It seems as if, when we wish any particular discovery or invention, in whatever field, we had but to turn our efforts in its direction to obtain our desire. We seem, in fact, to have awakened in the scenes of the Arabian Nights; yet the mysterious genius which we control, and which dims Aladdin's lamp, is the gift of no fairy godmother sustained by the haze of dreams, but shines as the child of science with fadeless and growing splendour, and may yet bring us and our little planet much closer to God.

     "We should indeed be happy, living as we do at this apex of attained civilization, with the boundless possibilities of the future unfolding before

     "We are freed from the rattling granite pavement of only a century ago, which made the occupant of an omnibus feel like a fly inside of a drum; from the domination of our local politics by ignorant foreigners; and from country roads that either filled the eyes, lungs, and hair of the unfortunates travelling upon them with dust, or, resembling ploughed and fertilized fields, saturated and plastered them with mud. These miseries, together with sea-sickness in ocean travelling, are forever passed, and we feel that `Excelsior!' is indeed our motto. Our new and increasing sources of power have so stimulated production and manufacturing that poverty or want is scarcely known; while the development of the popular demand, as a result of the supplied need, is so great that there is no visible limit to the diversification of industry or the possibilities of the arts.

     "It may seem strange to some that apparently so disproportionate a number of inventions have been made in the last century. There are several reasons. Since every discovery or advance in knowledge increases our chance of obtaining more, it becomes

     "Free to delve in the allurement and fascination of science, emancipated man goes on subduing Nature, as his Maker said he should, and turning her giant forces to his service in his constant struggle to rise and become more like Him who gave the commandments and showed him how he should go.

     Notwithstanding our strides in material progress,

     Knowing that the rectification of the earth's axis was satisfactorily begun, and that each year would show an increasing improvement in climate, many of the delegates, after hearing Bearwarden's speech, set out for their homes. Those from the valley of the Amazon and the eastern coast of South America boarded a lightning express that rushed them to Key West at the rate of three hundred miles an hour. The railroad had six tracks, two for through passengers, two for locals, and two for freight. There they took a "water-spider," six hundred feet long by three hundred in width, the deck of which was one hundred feet above the surface, which carried them over the water at the rate of a mile a minute, around the eastern end of Cuba, through Windward Passage, and so to the South

     The Siberian and Russian delegates, who, of course, felt a keen interest in the company's proceedings, took a magnetic double-ender car to Bering Strait. It was eighteen feet high, one hundred and fifty feet long, and had two stories. The upper, with a toughened glass dome running the entire length, descended to within three feet of the floor, and afforded an unobstructed view of the rushing scenery. The rails on which it ran were ten feet apart, the wheels being beyond the sides, like those of a carriage, and fitted with ball bearings to ridged axles. The car's flexibility allowed it to follow slight irregularities in the track, while the free, independent wheels gave it a great advantage in rounding curves over cars with wheels and axle in one casting, in which one must slip while traversing a greater or smaller arc than the other, except when the slope of the tread and the centrifugal force happen to correspond exactly. The fact of having its supports outside instead of underneath, while increasing its stability, also enabled the lower floor to come much nearer the ground, while still the

     The Patagonians went by the all-rail Intercontinental Line, without change of cars, making the run of ten thousand miles in forty hours. The Australians entered a flying machine, and were soon out of sight; while the Central Americans and members from other States of the Union returned for the most part in their mechanical phaetons.

     "A prospective improvement in travelling," said Bearwarden, as he and his friends watched the crowd disperse, "will be when we can rise beyond the limits of the atmosphere, wait till the earth revolves beneath us, and descend in twelve hours on the other side."

     "True," said Cortlandt, "but then we can travel westward only, and shall have to make a complete circuit when we wish to go east."

     A few days later there was a knock at President Bearwarden's door, while he was seated at his desk looking over some papers and other matters. Taking

     "Good-morning," said Bearwarden, as he shook hands with his visitors. "Charmed to see you."

     "That's a great invention," said Secretary Stillman, examining the bellows. "We must get Congress to make an appropriation for its introduction in the department buildings in Washington. You have no idea how it dries my throat to be all the time shouting, `Come in!'"

     "Do you know, Bearwarden," said Secretary Deepwaters, "I'm afraid when we have this millennium of climate every one will be so well satisfied that our friend here (pointing to Secretary Stillman with his thumb) will have nothing to do."

     I have sometimes thought some of the excitement will be gone, and the struggle of the `survival

     "The earth seems destined to have a calm old age," said Cortlandt, "unless we can look to the Cabinet to prevent it."

     "This world will soon be a dull place. I wish we could leave it for a change," said Ayrault. "I don't mean forever, of course, but just as people have grown tired of remaining like plants in the places in which they grew. Alan has been a caterpillar for untold ages; can he not become the butterfly?"

     "Since we have found out how to straighten the axis," said Deepwaters, "might we not go one better, and improve the orbit as well? -- increase the difference between aphelion and perihelion, and give those that still like a changing climate a chance, while incidentally we should see more of the world -- I mean the solar system -- and, by enlarging the parallax, be able to measure the distance of a greater number of fixed stars. Put your helm hard down and shout `Hard-a-lee!' You see, there is nothing simpler. You keep her off now, and six months hence you let her luff."

     "That's an idea!" said Bearwarden. "Our orbit

     "The only trouble," said Cortlandt, "is that we should have no fulcrum. Straightening the axis is simple enough, for we have the attraction of the sun with which to work, and we have but to increase it at one end while decreasing it at the other, and change this as the poles change their inclination towards the sun, to bring it about. If a comet with a sufficiently large head would but come along and retard us, or opportunely give us a pull, or if we

     "I have it!" exclaimed Ayrault, jumping up. "Apergy will do it. We can build an airtight projectile, hermetically seal ourselves within, and charge it in such a way that it will be repelled by the magnetism of the earth, and it will be forced from it with equal or greater violence than that with which it is ordinarily attracted. I believe the earth has but the same relation to space that the individual molecule has to any solid, liquid, or gaseous matter we know; and that, just as molecules strive to fly apart on the application of heat, this earth will repel that projectile when electricity, which we are coming to look upon as another form of heat, is properly applied. It must be so, and it is the manifest destiny of the race to improve it. Man is a spirit cursed with a mortal body, which glues him to the earth, and his yearning to rise, which is innate, is, I believe, only a part of his probation and trial."

     "Show us how it can be done," shouted his listeners in chorus.

     "Apergy is and must be able to do it," Ayrault continued. "Throughout Nature we find a system of compensation. The centripetal force is offset by the centrifugal; and when, according to the fable, the crystal complained of its hard lot in being unable to move, while the eagle could soar through the upper air and see all the glories of the world, the bird replied, `My life is but for a moment, while you, set in the rock, will live forever, and will see the last sunrise that flashes upon the earth.'

     "We know that Christ, while walking on the waves, did not sink, and that he and Elijah were carried up into heaven. What became of their material bodies we cannot tell, but they were certainly superior to the force of gravitation. We have no reason to believe that in miracles any natural law was broken, or even set aside, but simply that some other law, whose workings we do not understand, became operative and modified the law that otherwise would have had things its own way. In apergy we undoubtedly have the counterpart of gravitation, which must exist, or Nature's system of

     "May we not also believe," added Cortlandt, that in the transfiguration Christ's companions took the substance of their material bodies -- the oxygen, hydrogen, nitrogen, and carbon -- from the air and the moisture it contained; for, though spiritual bodies, be their activity magnetic or any other, could of course pass the absolute cold and void of space without being affected, no mortal body could; and that in the same manner Elijah's body dissolved into air without the usual intervention of decomposition; for we know that, though matter can easily change its form, it can never be destroyed."

     All assented to this, and Ayrault continued: "If apergy can annul gravitation, I do not see why it should not do more, for to annul it the repulsion of

     "Should you propose to go to Mars or Venus?" asked Cortlandt.

     "No," replied Ayrault, "we know all about Mars; it is but one seventh the size of the earth, and as the axis is inclined more than ours, it would be a less comfortable globe than this; while, as our president here told us in his T. A. S. Company's report, the axis of Venus is inclined to such a degree that it would be almost uninhabitable for us. It would be as if colonists tried to settle Greenland, or had come to North America during its Glacial period. Neither Venus nor Mars would be a good place now."

     "Where should you propose to go?" asked Stillman.

     "To Jupiter, and, if possible, after that to Sat

     "Splendid!" said Bearwarden. "If Mr. Dumby, our vice-president, will temporarily assume my office, nothing will give me greater pleasure."

     "So will I go, if there is room for me," said Cortlandt. "I will at once resign my place as Government expert, and consider it the grandest event of my life."

     "If I were not afraid of leaving Stillman here to his own devices, I'd ask for a berth as well," said Deepwaters.

     "I am afraid," said Stillman, if you take any more, you will be overcrowded."

     "Modesty forbids his saying," said Deepwaters, "that it wouldn't do for the country to have all its eggs in one basket."

     "Are you not afraid you will find the surface hot, or even molten?" asked Vice-President Dumby. "With its eighty-six thousand five hundred mile diameter, the amount of original internal heat must have been terrific."

     "No, said Cortlandt, "it cannot be molten, or even in the least degree luminous, for, if it were, its satellites would be visible when they enter its shadow, whereas they entirely disappear."

     "I do not believe Jupiter's surface is even perceptibly warm," said Bearwarden. "We know that Algol, known to the ancients as the `Demon Star,' and several other variable stars, are accompanied by a dark companion, with which they revolve about a common centre, and which periodically obscures part of their light. Now, some of these non-luminaries are nearly as large as our sun, and, of course, many hundred times the size of Jupiter. If these bodies have lost enough heat to be invisible, Jupiter's surface at least must be nearly cold."

     "In the phosphorescence of seawater," said Cortlandt, "and in other instances in Nature, we find light without heat, and we may soon be able to produce it in the arts by oxidizing coal without the

     "I am convinced," said Bearwarden, "that we shall find Jupiter habitable for intelligent beings who have been developed on a more advanced sphere than itself, though I do not believe it has progressed far enough in its evolution to produce them. I expect to find it in its Palaeozoic or Mesozoic period, while over a hundred years ago the English astronomer, Chambers, thought that on Saturn there was good reason for suspecting the presence of snow."

     "What sort of spaceship do you propose to have?" asked the vice-president.

     "As you have to pass through but little air," said Deepwaters, "I should suggest a short-stroke cylinder of large diameter, with a flat base and dome roof, composed of aluminum, or, still better, of glucinum or beryllium as it is sometimes called, which is twice as good a conductor of electricity as aluminum, four times as strong, and is the lightest of all known metals, having a specific gravity of only two, which last property will be of great use to you, for of course the more weight you have to propel the more apergetic repulsion you will have to develop."

     "I will get some drawing-paper I left outside in my trap," said Ayrault, "when with your ideas we may arrive at something definite," saying which, he left the room.

     "He seems very cynical in his ideas of life and the world in general," said Secretary Stillman, "for a man of his age, and one that is engaged."

     "You see," replied Bearwarden, " his fiancee is not yet a senior, being in the class of two thousand and one at Vassar, and so cannot marry him for a year. Not till next June can this sweet girl graduate come forth with her mortar-board and sheepskin to enlighten the world and make him happy. That is, I suspect, one reason why he proposed this trip."

     In a few moments Ayrault returned with pencils, a pair of compasses, and paper.

     "Let us see, in the first place," said Deepwaters, "how long the journey will take. Since a stone falls 16.09 feet the first second, and 64+ feet the next, it is easy to calculate at what rate your speed would increase with the repulsion twice that of the ordinary traction. But I think this would be too slow. It will be best to treble or quadruple the apergetic charge, which can easily be done, in which case your speed will exceed the muzzle-velocity of a projectile from a long-range gun, in a few seconds. As the earth's repulsion decreases, the attraction of mars and Jupiter will increase, and, there being no resistance, your gait will become more and more rapid till it is necessary to reverse the charge to avoid being dashed

     "Jupiter, when in opposition," he continued, "is about 380,000,000 miles from us, and it takes light,

     "I think," said Ayrault, "as that will be the first member of Jupiter's system we pass, and as it will guide us into port, it would be a good name for our ship, and you must christen her if we have her launched."

     "No, no,"said Deepwaters, "Miss Preston must do that; but we certainly should have a launch, for you might have to land in the water, and you must be sure the ship is tight."

     "Talking of tight ships," said Bearwarden, passing a decanter of claret to Stillman, "may remind us that it is time to splice the `main brace.' There's a bottle of whisky and some water just behind you," he added to Deepwaters, "while three minutes after

     "I see you know his ways," said Stillman to Bearwarden, drooping his eyes in Deepwaters's direction.

     "Oh, yes, I've been here before," replied Deepwaters. "You see, we navy men have to hustle now-a-days, and can't pass our time in a high-backed chair, talking platitudes."

     At this moment there was a slight rumbling, and eight champagne cocktails, with the froth still on, and straws on a separate plate, shot in and landed on a corner of the desk.

     "Help yourselves, gentlemen," said Bearwarden, placing them on a table; "I hope we shall find them cold."

     "Do you know," said Deepwaters to Ayrault, while rapidly making his cocktail disappear, "the Callisto's cost with its outfit will be very great, especially if you use glucinum, which, though the ideal metal for the purpose, comes pretty high? I suggest that you apply to Congress for an appropriation. This experiment comes under the `Promotion

     "No, indeed," replied Ayrault; "the Callisto trip will be a privilege and glory I would not miss, and building her will be a part of it. I shall put in everything conducive to success, but will come to the Government only for advice."

     "I will send a letter to all our ambassadors and consuls," said Stillman, "to telegraph the department anything they may know or learn that will be of use in adjusting the batteries, controlling the machine, or anything else, and will turn over to you in a succinct form all information that may be relevant, for without such sorting you would be overwhelmed."

     "And I," said Deepwaters, "will order the commanders of our vessels to give you a farewell salute at starting, and to pick you up in case you fail. When you have demonstrated the suitability of apergy," he continued, "and the habitability of Jupiter and Saturn -- ,which, with their five and eight moons, respectively, and rings thrown in, must both be vastly superior to our little second-rate globe -- we will see what can be done towards changing our orbit, and

     "As every place seems to have been settled from some other," said Cortlandt, "I do not see why, with increased scientific facilities, history should not repeat itself, and this be the point from which to colonize the solar system; for, for the present at least, it would seem that we could not get beyond that."

     "As it will be quite an undertaking to change the orbit, said Deepwaters, "we shall have time meanwhile to absorb or run out all inferior races, so that we shall not make the mistake of extending the Tower of Babel."

     "He is putting on his war-paint," said Stillman, "and will soon want a planet to himself."

     "I see no necessity for even changing the orbit," said Bearwarden, "except for the benefit of those that remain. If this attempt succeeds, it can doubtless be repeated. An increase in eccentricity would

     "Let us know how you are getting on," said Deepwaters to Ayrault, "and be sure you have the Callisto properly christened. Step lively there, landlubbers!" he called to Stillman; "I have an appointment at Washington at one, and it is now twenty minutes past twelve. We can lunch on the way."

     Ayrault immediately advertised for bids for the construction of a glucinum cylinder twenty-five feet in diameter, fifteen feet high at the sides, with a domed roof, bringing up the total height to twenty-one feet, and with a small gutter about it to catch the rain on Jupiter or any other planet they might visit. The sides, roof, and floor were to consist of two sheets, each one third of an inch thick and six inches apart, the space between to be filled with mineral wool, as a protection against the intense cold of space. There were also to be several keels and supports underneath, on which the car should rest. Large, toughened plate-glass windows were to be let into the roof and sides, and smaller ones in the floor, all to be furnished with thick shades and curtains. Ayrault also decided to have it divided into two

     As soon as possible he awarded the contract, and then entering his smart electric trap, steered for Vassar University along what was the old post-road -- though its builders would not have recognized it with its asphalt surface, straightened curves, and easy grades -- to ask his idol to christen the Callisto when it should be finished.

     Starting from the upper end of Central Park, he stopped to buy her a bunch of violets, and then ran to Poughkeepsie in two hours.

     Sylvia Preston was a lovely girl, with blue eyes, brown hair, and perfect figure, clear white skin, and just twenty. She was delighted to see him, and said she would love to christen the Callisto or do anything else that he wished. "But I am so sorry

     "Why couldn't we be married now," he asked, "and go to Jupiter for our honeymoon?"

     "I'm afraid, dear," she answered, "you would be sorry a few years hence if I didn't take my degree; and, besides, as you have asked those other men, there wouldn't be room for me."

     "We could have made other arrangements," he replied, "had I been able to persuade you to go."

     "Won't you dine with us at Delmonico's this evening, and go to the play?" she asked. "Papa has taken a box."

     "Of course I will," he said, brightening up. "What are you going to wear?"

     "Oh, I suppose something light and cool, for it's so hot," she answered.

     "I'll go now, so as to be ready," he said, getting up and going towards the door to which Sylvia followed him.

     A man in livery stood at the step of the phaeton. Ayrault got in and turned on the current, and his man climbed up behind.

     On turning into the main road Ayrault was about to increase his speed, when Sylvia, who had taken a short cut appeared at the wayside carrying her hat in one hand and her gloves in the other.

     "I couldn't let you go all by yourself," she said. "The fact is, I wanted to be with you."

     "You are the sweetest thing that ever lived, and I'll love you all my days," he said, getting down and helping Sylvia to the seat beside him. "What a nuisance this fellow behind is!" he continued -- referring to the groom -- "for, though he is a Russian, and speaks but little English, it is unpleasant to feel he is there."

     "You'll have to write your sweet nothings, instead of saying them," Sylvia replied.

     "For you to leave around for other girls to see," answered Ayrault with a smile.

     "I don't know what your other girls do," she returned, "but with me you are safe."

     Ayrault fairly made his phaeton spin, going up the grades like a shot and down like a bird. On reaching New York, he left Sylvia at her house, then ran his machine to a florist's, where he ordered some lilies and roses, and then steered his way to his club,

     "How are the exams getting on, Miss Preston?" Bearwarden asked.

     "Pretty well," she replied, with a smile. "We had English literature yesterday, and natural history the day before. Next week we have chemistry and philosophy."

     "What are you taking in natural history?" asked Bearwarden, with interest.

     "Oh, principally physical geography, geology, and meteorology," she replied. "I think them entrancing."

     "It must be a consolation," said Ayrault, " when your best hat is spoiled by rain, to know the reason why. Your average," he continued, addressing Sylvia, "was ninety in the semi-annuals, and I haven't a doubt that the finals will maintain your record for the year."

     "Don't be too sure," she replied. "I have been loafing awfully, and had to engage a `grind' as a coach."

     After dinner they went to the play, where they saw a presentation of Society at the Close of the Twentieth Century, which Sylvia and Ayrault enjoyed immensely.

     A few days after the Delmonico dinner, while Bearwarden, Cortlandt, and Ayrault sat together discussing their plans, the servant announced Ayrault's family physician, Dr. Tubercle Germiny, who had been requested to call.

     "Delighted to see you, doctor," said Ayrault, shaking hands. "You know Col. Bearwarden, our President, and Dr. Cortlandt -- an LL. D., however, and not a medico."

     "I have had the pleasure," replied Dr. Germiny, shaking hands with both.

     "As you may be aware, doctor," said Ayrault, when they were seated, "we are about to take a short trip to Jupiter, and, if time allows, to Saturn. We have come to you, as one familiar with every known germ, for a few precautionary suggestions and advice concerning our medicine-chest."

     "Indeed!" replied Dr. Germiny, "a thorough knowledge of bacteriology is the groundwork of therapeutics. It is practically admitted that every ailment, with the exception of mechanical injuries, is the direct result of a specific germ; and even in accidents and simple fractures, no matter what may be the nature of the bruise, a micro-organism soon announces its presence, so that if not the parent, it is the inseparable companion, in fact the shadow, of disease. Now, though not the first cause in this instance, it has been indubitably proved, that much of the effect, the fever and pain, are produced and continued by the active, omnipresent, sleepless sperm. Either kill the micrococcus or heal the wound, and you are free from both. It being, therefore, granted that the ills of life are in the air, we have but to find the peculiar nature of the case in hand, its habits, tastes, and constitution, in order to destroy it. Impoverish the soil on which it thrives, before its arrival, if you can foresee the nature of the inoculation to which you will be exposed, by a dilute solution of itself, and supply it only with what it particularly dislikes. For an already established tubercle requiring rapid action of the blood, such as

     "I see you have these poisons at your fingers' ends," said Ayrault, "and we shall feel the utmost confidence in the remedies and directions you prescribe."

     They found that, in addition to their medicine-chest, they would have to make room for the following articles, and also many more: six shot-guns (three double-barrel 12-bores, three magazine 10-bores,) three rifles, three revolvers; a large supply of ammunition (explosive and solid balls), hunting-knives, fishing-tackle, compass, sextant, geometrical instruments, canned food for forty days, appliance for renewing air, clothing, rubber boots, apergetic apparatus, protection-wires, aneroid barometer, and kodaks.

     At last the preparations were completed, and it was arranged that the Callisto should begin its journey at eleven o'clock A. M., December 21st -- the northern hemisphere's shortest day.

     Though six months' operations could hardly be expected to have produced much change in the inclination of the earth's axis, the autumn held on wonderfully, and December was pronounced very mild. Fully a million people were in and about Van Cortlandt Park hours before the time announced for the start, and those near looked inquiringly at the trim little air-ship, that, having done well on the trial trip, rested on her longitudinal and transverse keels, with a battery of chemicals alongside, to make sure of a full power supply.

     The President and his Cabinet-including, of

     "There's a ship for you!" said Secretary Stillman to the Secretary of the Navy. "She'll not have to be dry-docked for barnacles, neither will the least breeze make the passengers sick."

     "That's all you landlubbers think of," replied Deepwaters. "I remember one of the kings over in Europe said to me, as he introduced me to the queen: `Your Secretary of State is a great man, but why does he always part his hair in the middle?'

     "`So that it shall not turn his head,' I replied.

     "`But with so gallant and handsome an officer as you to lean upon,' he answered, `I should think he could look down on all the world.' Whereupon I asked him what he'd take to drink."

     "Your apology is accepted," replied Secretary Stillman.

     Cortlandt also came from Washington, where, as chief of the Government's Expert Examiners Board,

     "You will have an ideal trip," she said, looking over some astronomical star-charts and photographic maps of Jupiter and Saturn that lay on the table, with a pair of compasses, "and I hope you won't lose your way."

     "I shall need no compass to find my way back," replied Ayrault, "if I ever succeed in leaving this planet; neither will star-charts be necessary, for you will be a magnet stronger than any compass, and, compared with my star, all others are dim."

     "You should write a book," said Sylvia, "and put some of those things in it." She was wearing a bunch of forget-me-nots and violets that she had cut from a small flower-garden of potted plants Ayrault

     At this moment the small chime clock set in the Callisto's wood-work rang out quarter to eleven. As the sounds died away, Sylvia became very pale, and began to regret in her womanly way that she had allowed her hero to attempt this experiment.

     "Oh," she said, clinging to his arm, "it was very wrong of me to let you begin this. I was so dazzled by the splendour of your scheme when I heard it, and so anxious that you should have the glory of being the first to surpass Columbus, that I did not realize the full meaning. I thought, also, you seemed rather ready to leave me," she added gently, "and so said little; you do not know how it almost breaks my heart now that I am about to lose you. It was quixotic to let you undertake this journey."

     "An undertaker would have given me his kind offices for one even longer, had I remained here," replied Ayrault. "I cannot live in this humdrum world without you. The most sustained excitement cannot even palliate what seems to me like unrequited love."

     "O Dick!" she exclaimed, giving him a re

     "Never mind, sweetheart," he said, kissing her hand, "I have seemed on the verge of despair all the time."

     Seeing that their separation must shortly begin, Ayrault tried to assume a cheerful look; but as Sylvia turned her eyes away they were suspiciously moist.

     Just one minute before the starting-time Ayrault took Sylvia back to her mother, and, after pressing her hand and having one last long look into her -- or, as he considered them, his -- deep-sea eyes, he returned to the Callisto, and was standing at the foot of the telescopic aluminum ladder when his friends arrived. As all baggage and impedimenta bad been sent aboard and properly stowed the day before, the travellers had not to do but climb to and enter by the second-story window.

     It distressed Bearwarden that the north pole's exact declination on the 21st day of December, when the axis was most inclined, could not be figured out by the hour at which they were to start, so as to show what change, if any, had already been brought about, but the astronomers were working industriously, and promised that, if it were finished by midnight, they would telegraph the result into space by flash-light code.

     Raising his hat to his fiancee and his prospective parents-in-law, Ayrault followed them up. To draw in and fold the ladder was but the work of a moment. As the clocks in the neighbouring steeples began to strike eleven, Ayrault touched the switch that would correspond to the throttle of an engine, and the motors began to work at rapidly increasing speed. Slowly the Callisto left her resting-place as a Galatea might her pedestal, only, instead of coming down, she rose still higher.

     A large American flag hanging from the window, which, as they started, fluttered as in a southern zephyr, soon began to flap as in a stiff breeze as the car's speed increased. With a final wave, at which a battery of twenty-one field-pieces made the air ring

     Sylvia had waved her handkerchief with the utmost enthusiasm, in spite of the sadness at her heart. But she now had other use for it in trying to hide her tears. The Callisto was still going straight up, with a speed already as great as a cannon ball's, and was almost out of sight. The multitude then began to disperse, and Sylvia returned to her home.

     Let us now follow the Callisto. The earth and Jupiter not being exactly in opposition, as they would be if the sun, the earth, and Jupiter were in line, with the earth between the two, but rather as shown in the diagram, the Callisto's journey was considerably more than 380,000,000 miles, the mean opposition distance. As they wished to start by daylight -- i. e., from the side of the earth turned towards the sun -- they could not steer immediately for Jupiter, but were obliged to go a few hundred miles in the direction of the sun, then change their course to

     The maximum power being turned on, the projectile shot from the earth with tremendous and rapidly increasing speed, by the shortest course -- i. e., a straight line -- so that for the present it was not necessary to steer. Until beyond the limits of the atmosphere they kept the greatest apergetic repulsion focused on the upper part of their cylinder, so that its point went first, and they encountered least possible resistance. Looking through the floor windows, therefore, the travellers had a most superb view. The air being clear, the eastern border of North America and the Atlantic were outlined as on a map, the blue of the ocean and brownish colour of the land, with white snow-patches on the elevations, being very marked. The Hudson and the Sound appeared as clearly defined blue ribbons, and between and around the two they could see New York. They also saw the ocean dotted for miles with points in which they recognized the marine spiders and cruisers of the North Atlantic squadron, and the

     "I see," said Cortlandt, "that Deepwaters has been as good as his word, and has his ships on the watch to rescue us in case we fail."

     "Yes," replied Bearwarden, "he is the right sort. When he gave that promise I knew his men would be there."

     They soon perceived that they had reached the void of space, for, though the sun blazed with a splendour they had never before seen, the firmament was intensely black, and the stars shone as at midnight. Here they began to change their course to a curve beginning with a spiral, by charging the Callisto apergetically, and directing the current towards the moon, to act as an aid to the lunar attraction, while still allowing the earth to repel, and their motion gradually became the resultant of the two forces, the change from a straight line being so gradual, however, that for some minutes they scarcely perceived it. The coronal streamers about the sun, such as are visible on earth during a total eclipse, shone with a halo against the ultra-Cimmerian background, bursting forth to a height of twenty or thirty thou

     "I believe," said Cortlandt, pointing to the streamers, "that they are masses of gas thrown beyond the sun's atmosphere, which expand enormously when the pressure to which they are subjected in the sun is removed -- for only in space freed from resistance could they move at such velocities, and that their brilliancy is increased by great electrical disturbance. If they were entirely the play of electrical forces, their change of place would be practically instantaneous, which, however rapid their movement, is not the case."

     Finding that they were rapidly swinging towards their proper course, and that the earth in its journey about the sun would move out of their way, they divided their power between repelling the body they had left and increasing the attraction of the moon, and then set about getting their house in order.

     Bearwarden, having the largest appetite, was elected cook, the others sagely divining that labour so largely for himself would be no trial. Their small but business-like-looking electric range was therefore soon in full blast, with Bearwarden in command. It had enough current to provide heat for cooking for four hundred hours, which was an ample margin, and it had this advantage, that, no matter how much it was used, it could not exhaust the air as any other form of heat would

     There were also a number of sixteen-candle-power incandescent lamps, so that when passing through the shadow of a planet, or at night after their arrival on Jupiter, their car would be brightly illuminated. They had also a good search-light for examining the dark side of a satellite, or exploring the spaces in Saturn's rings. Having lunched sumptuously on canned chicken soup, beef a la jardiniere, and pheasant that had been sent them by some of their admirers that morning, they put the bones and the glass can that had contained the soup into the double-doored partition or vestibule, placing a large sheet of cardboard to act as a wad between the scraps and the outside door. By pressing a button they unfastened the outside door, and the articles to be disposed of were shot off by the expansion of the air between the cardboard disk and the inside door; after which the outside door was drawn back to its place by a current sent through a magnet, but little power being required to reclose it with no resisting atmospheric pressure. As the electricity ran along a wire passing through a hermetically sealed opening in the floor, there was no way by which more air than that in the vestibule could escape; and as the somewhat flat space

     "By filling the vestibule as full as possible," said Bearwarden, "and so displacing most of its air, we shall be able to open the outside door oftener without danger of rarefaction."

     The things they had discharged flew off with considerable speed and were soon out of sight; but it was not necessary for them to move fast, provided they moved at all, for, the resistance being nil, they would be sure to go beyond the range of vision, provided enough time was allowed, even if the Callisto's speed was not being increased by apergy, in which case articles outside and not affected would be quickly left behind.

     The earth, which at first had filled nearly half their sky, was rapidly growing smaller. Being almost between themselves and the sun, it looked like a crescent moon; and when it was only about twenty times the size of the moon they calculated they must have come nearly two hundred thousand miles. The moon was now on what a sailor would call the starboard bow -- i. e., to the right and ahead. Being

     It was just ten hours since they had started, and at that moment 9 A. M. in New York; but, though it was night there, the Callisto was bathed in a flood of sunlight such as never shines on earth. The only night they would have was on the side of the Callisto turned away from the sun, unless they passed through some shadow, which they intended to avoid on account of the danger of colliding with a meteor in the dark. The moon and the Callisto were moving on converging lines, the curve on which they had entered having swung them to the side nearest the earth; but they saw that their own tremendous and increasing speed would carry them in front of the moon in its nearly circular orbit. Wishing to change the direction of their flight by the moon's attraction, they shut off the power driving them from the earth, whereupon the Callisto turned its heavy base towards the moon. They were already moving at such speed that their momentum alone

     They closely watched the Callisto's course. At first it did not seem to deflect from a straight line, and they stood ready to turn on the apergetic force again, when the car very slowly began to show the effect of the moon's near pull; but not till they had so far passed it that the dark side was towards them were they heading straight for Jupiter. Then they again turned on full power and got a send-off shove

     "We must be ready to watch the signals from the arctic circle," said Bearwarden. "At midnight, if the calculations are finished, the result will be flashed by the searchlight." It was then ten minutes to twelve, and the earth was already over four hundred thousand miles away. Focusing their glasses upon the region near the north pole, which, being turned from the sun, was towards them and in darkness, they waited.

     "In this blaze of sunlight," said Cortlandt, "I am afraid we can see nothing."

     Fortunately, at this moment the Callisto entered the moon's tapering shadow.

     "This," said Ayrault, "is good luck. We could of course have gone into the shadow; but to change our course would have delayed us, and we might have lost part of the chance of increasing our speed."

     "There will be no danger from, meteors or sub-satellites here," said Bearwarden, "for anything revolving about the moon at this distance would be caught by the earth."

     The sun had apparently set behind the moon, and they were eclipsed. The stars shone with the utmost splendour against the dead-black sky, and the earth appeared as a large crescent, still considerably larger than the satellite to which they were accustomed. Exactly at midnight a faint phosphorescent light, like that of a glow-worm, appeared in the region of Greenland on the planet they had left. It gradually increased its strength till it shone like a long white beam projected from a lighthouse, and in this they beheld the work of the greatest search-light ever made by man, receiving for a few moments all the electricity generated by the available dynamos at Niagara and the Bay of Fundy, the steam engines, and other sources of power in the northern hemisphere. The beam lasted with growing intensity for one minute; it then spelled out with clean-cut intervals, according to the Cable Code: "23^o no' 6". The southern hemisphere pumps are now raising and storing water at full blast. We have already begun to lower the Arctic Ocean."

     "Victory!" shouted Bearwarden, in an ecstasy of delight. "Nearly half a degree in six months, with but one pole working. If we can add at this

     "Look!" said Ayrault, "they are sending something else." The flashes came in rapid succession, reaching far into space. With their glasses fixed upon them, they made out these sentences: "Our telescopes, in whatever part of the earth was turned towards you, have followed you since you started, and did not lose sight of you till you entered the moon's shadow. On your present course you will be in darkness till 12.16, when we shall see you again."

     On receiving this last earthly message, the travellers sprang to their searchlight, and, using its full power, telegraphed back the following: "Many thanks to you for good news about earth, and to Secretary Deepwaters for lending us the navy. Result of work most glorious. Remember us to everybody. Shadow's edge approaching."

     This was read by the men in the great observatories, who evidently telephoned to the arctic Signal Light immediately, for it flashed back: "Got your message perfectly. Wish you greatest luck. The

     At that moment the shadow swept by, and they were in the full blaze of cloudless day. The change was so great that for a moment they were obliged to close their eyes. The polished sides of the Callisto shone so brightly that they knew they were easily seen. The power temporarily diverted in sending them the message then returned to the work of draining the Arctic Ocean, which, as the north pole was now returning to the sun, was the thing to do, and the travellers resumed their study of the heavenly bodies.

     Never before had the travellers observed the stars and planets under such favourable conditions. No air or clouds intervened, and as the Callisto did not revolve on its axis there was no necessity for changing the direction of the glasses. After an hour of this interesting work, however, as it was already late at the longitude they had left on earth, and as they knew they had many days in space before them, they prepared to go to bed. When ready, they had only to pull down the shades; for, as apergy was not applied to them, but only to the Callisto, they still looked upon the floor as down, and closed the heavy curtains to have night or darkness. They found that the side of the Callisto turned constantly towards the sun was becoming very warm, the double-toughened glass windows making it like a greenhouse; but

     "We could easily have arranged," said Ayrault, for night and day on alternate sides of the Callisto by having strips of metal arranged spirally on the outside as on the end of an arrow. These would have started us turning as slowly as we like, since we passed through the atmosphere at a comparatively low rate of speed."

     "I am afraid," said Cortlandt, "the motion, however slow, would have made us dizzy. It would be confusing to see the heavens turning about us, and it would interfere with using the glasses."

     The base and one side of the Callisto had constant sunshine, while the other side and the dome were in the blackest night. This dome, on account of its shape, sky windows, and the completeness with which it could be isolated, was an ideal observatory, and there was seldom a time during their waking hours for the rest of the journey when it was not occupied by one, two, or all the observers.

     "There is something marvellous," said Cortlandt, "about the condition of space. Its absolute cold is appalling, apparently because there is nothing to absorb heat; yet we find the base of this material projectile uncomfortably warm, though, should we expose a thermometer in the shade in front, we know it would show a temperature of three hundred to four hundred degrees below zero -- were the instrument capable of recording it."

     Artificial darkness having been obtained, the travellers were soon asleep, Bearwarden's dreams being regaled with thoughts of his company's triumph; Ayrault's, naturally, with visions of Sylvia; while Cortlandt frequently started up, thinking he had already made some great astronomical discovery.

     About 9 A. M., according to seventy-fifth meridian time, the explorers awoke feeling greatly refreshed. The tank in which the liquefied oxygen was kept automatically gave off its gas so evenly that the air remained normal, while the lime contained in cups absorbed the carbon dioxide as fast as they exhaled it. They had darkened those windows through which the sun was actually pouring, for, on account of the emptiness of the surrounding ether and consequent

     "We must," said Bearwarden, "be moving at the rate of nearly a million miles an hour, from the way we have travelled."

     "We must be doing fully a million," replied Cortlandt, "for by this time we are pretty well in motion, having got a tremendous start when so near the moon, with it and the earth in line."

     By steering straight for Jupiter, instead of for the place it would occupy ten days later, they knew they would swing past, for the giant planet, being in rapid motion, would advance; but they did not object to this, since it would give them a chance to examine their new world in case they wished to do so before alighting; while, if they preferred to land at once, they could easily change their course by means of the moons, the fourth, from which their car was named, being the one that they knew would be of most use.

     The first thing that attracted their attention was the size and brilliance of Mars. Although this red planet was over forty million miles from the earth when they started, they calculated that it was less than thirty million miles from them now, or five millions

     Towards evening they noticed through their glasses that several apparently island peaks in the southern hemisphere, which was turned towards them, became white, from which they concluded that a snow-storm was in progress. The south polar

     "As the Marsian winters must be fully as severe as ours," said Cortlandt, "on account of their length, the planet's distance from the sun, and the twenty-seven and a half degrees inclination of its axis, we can account for the smallness of its ice-caps only by the fact that its oceans cover but one fourth of its surface instead of three quarters, as on the earth, and there is consequently a smaller evaporation and rain and snow-fall."

     They were too much interested to think of sleeping that night, and so, after dining comfortably returned to their observatory. When within four million miles of Mars the Callisto began to swerve perceptibly, its curve, as when near the moon beginning with a spiral. They swung on unconcernedly, however, knowing they could check their approach at any time. Soon Mars appeared to have a diameter ten times as great as that of the moon, and promised shortly to occupy almost one side of their sky.

     We must be on the lookout for the satellites,"

     They therefore turned their glasses in the direction of the satellites.

     "Until Prof. Hall, at Washington, discovered the two satellites in 1877," he continued, "Mars was supposed to be without moons. The outer one, Deimos, is but six miles in diameter, and revolves about its primary in thirty hours and eighteen minutes, at a distance of fourteen thousand six hundred miles. As it takes but little longer to complete a revolution than Mars does to rotate on its axis, it remains in the Martial sky one hundred and thirty-two hours between rising and setting, passing through all the phases from new moon to full and back again four times; that is, it swings four times around Mars before going below the horizon. It is one of the smallest bodies discovered with a telescope. The inner one, Phobos, is considerably larger, having a diameter of about twenty miles. It is but twenty-seven hundred miles from Mars's surface, and completes its revolution in seven hours and thirty-eight minutes, which is shorter than any other known period, Jupiter's nearest moon being the next, with

     When about fifteen thousand miles from Mars, they sighted Deimos directly ahead, and saw that they should pass on its left -- i. e., behind -- for it was moving across them. The sun poured directly upon it, making it appear full and showing all its features. There were small unevennesses on the surface, apparently seventy or a hundred feet high, which were the nearest approach to mountains, and they ran in ridges or chains. There were also unmistakable signs of volcanic action, the craters being large compared with the size of the planet, but shallow. They saw no signs of water, and the blackness of the shadows convinced them there was no air. They secured two instantaneous photographs of the little satellite as the Callisto swept by, and resumed their inspection of Mars. They noticed red and brownish patches on the peaks that had that morning turned

     "We must be ready to repel boarders," said Bearwarden, observing it for the first time and fixing his glass upon it. "That must be Phobos."

     Not ten miles off they beheld Mars's inner moon, and though their own speed caused them to overtake and rush by it like a whirlwind, the satellite's rapid motion in its orbit, in a course temporarily almost parallel with theirs, served to give them a chance the better to examine it. Here the mountain ranges were considerably more conspicuous than on Deimos, and there were boulders and loose stones upon their slopes, which looked as if there might at some time have been frost and water on its surface; but it was all dry now, neither was there any air. The evidences

     "Either of those," said Bearwarden, looking back at the little satellites, "would be a nice yacht for a man to explore space on. He would also, of course, need a sun to warm him, if he wished to go beyond this system, but that would not have to be a large affair -- in fact, it might be smaller than the planet, and could revolve about it like a moon."

     "Though a sun of that size," replied Cortlandt,

     "There are known to be several unclaimed masses," added Ayrault, "with diameters of a few hundred yards, revolving about the earth inside the orbit of the moon. If in some way two of these

     "Bravo!" said Bearwarden. "There is no limit to what can be done. The idea of our present trip would have seemed more chimerical to people a hundred years ago than this new scheme appears now."

     Thus they sat and talked, or studied maps and star-charts, or the stars themselves, while the hours quickly passed and they shot through space. They had now a straight stretch of over three hundred million miles, and had to cross the orbits of innumerable asteroids on the way. The apparent size of the sun had by this time considerably decreased,

     The following day, while in their observatory, they saw something not many miles ahead. They watched it for hours, and in fact all day, but notwithstanding their tremendous speed they came but little nearer.

     "They say a stern chase is a long one," said Bearwarden; but that beats anything I have ever seen."

     After a while, however, they found they were nearer, the time taken having been in part due to the deceptive distance, which was greater than they supposed.

     "A comet!" exclaimed Cortlandt excitedly. "We shall really be able to examine it near."

     "It's going in our direction," said Ayrault, "and at almost exactly our speed."

     While the sun shone full upon it they brought their camera into play, and again succeeded in photographing a heavenly body at close range. The nucleus or head was of course turned towards the sun; while the tail, which they could see faintly, preceded it, as the comet was receding towards the cold and dark depths of space. The head was only a few miles in diameter, for it was a small comet, and was composed of grains and masses of stone and meteoric iron. Many of the grains were no larger than peas or mustard-seeds; no mass was more than four feet in diameter, and all of them had very irregular shapes. The space between the particles was never less than one hundred times their masses.

     "We can move about within it," said Ayrault, as the Callisto entered the aggregation of particles, and moved slowly forward among them.

     The windows in the dome, being made of toughened glass, set somewhat slantingly so as to deflect anything touching them, and having, moreover, the pressure of the inside air to sustain them, were fairly safe, while the windows in the sides and base were but little exposed. Whenever a large mass seemed dangerously near the glass, they applied an apergetic

     Much of the material was like slag from a furnace, having evidently been partly fused. Whether this heat was the result of collision or of its near approach to the sun at perihelion, they could not tell, though the latter explanation seemed most simple and probable. When at about the centre of the

     "I now understand," said Bearwarden, "why stars of the sixth and seventh magnitude can be seen through thousands of miles of a comet's tail. It is simply because there is nothing in it. The reason any stars are obscured is because the light in the tail, however faint, is brighter than they, and that light is all that the caudal appendage consists of, though what produces it I confess I am unable to explain. I also see why the tail always stretches away from the sun, because near by it is overwhelmed by the more powerful light; in fact, I suspect it is principally in the comet's shadow that the tail is visible. It is strange that no one ever thought of

     "How, then," asked Cortlandt, "do you account for the spaces between those stones? However slight gravitation might be between some of the grains, if it existed at all, or was unopposed by some other force, with sufficient time -- and they have eternity -- every comet would come together like a planet into one solid mass. Perhaps some similar force maintains gases in the distended tail, though I know of no such, or even any analogous manifestation on earth. If the law on which we have been brought up, that `every atom in the universe attracts every other atom,' were without exceptions or modifications, that comet could not continue to exist in its present form. Until we get some additional illustration, however, we shall be short of data with which to formulate any iconoclastic hypothesis. The source of the light,

     Having gone beyond the fragments, they applied a strong repulsion charge to the comet, creating thereby a perfect whirlpool among its particles, and quickly left it. Half an hour later they again shut off the current, as the Callisto's speed was sufficient.

     For some time they had been in the belt of asteroids, but as yet they had seen none near. The morning following their experience with the comet, however, they went to their observatory after breakfast as usual, and, on pointing their glasses forward, espied a comparatively large body before them, a little to their right.

     "That must be Pallas," said Cortlandt, scrutinizing it closely. "It was discovered by Olbers, in 1802, and was the second asteroid found, Ceres having been the first, in 1801. It has a diameter of about three hundred miles, being one of the largest of these small planets. The most wonderful thing about it is the inclination of its orbit -- thirty-five degrees -- to the plane of the ecliptic; which means that at each revolution in its orbit, it swings that much above and below the imaginary plane cutting the sun at its equator,

     It soon presented the phase of a half moon, but the waviness of the straight line, as in the case of Venus and Mercury, showed that the size of the mountains must be tremendous compared with the mass of the body, some of them being obviously fifteen miles high. The intense blackness of the shadows, as on the moon, convinced them there was no trace of atmosphere.

     "There being no air," said Cortlandt, "it is safe to assume there is no water, which helps to account for the great inequalities on the body's surface, since the mountains will seem higher when surrounded by dry ocean-bottom than they would if water came halfway up their sides. Undoubtedly, however, the main cause of their height is the slight effect of gravitation

     "The temperature and condition of a body," continued Cortlandt, "seem to depend entirely on its size. In the sun we have an incandescent, gaseous star, though its spots and the colour of its rays show that it is becoming aged, or, to be more accurate, advanced in its evolutionary development. Then comes a great jump, for Jupiter has but about one fourteen-hundredth of the mass of the sun, and we expect to find on it a firm crust, and that the planet itself is at about the fourth or fifth period of development, described by Moses as days. Saturn is doubtless somewhat more advanced. The earth we know has been habitable many hundreds of thousands or millions of years, though three fourths of its surface is still covered by water. In Mars we see a further step, three fourths of its surface being land. In Mercury, could we study it better, or in the larger satellites of Jupiter or Saturn, we might find a stepping-stone from Mars to the moon, perhaps with no water, but still having air, and being habitable in all other respects.

      As they left Pallas between themselves and the sun, it became a crescent and finally disappeared.

     Two days later they sighted another asteroid exactly ahead. They examined it closely, and concluded it must be Hilda, put down in the astronomies as No. 153, and having almost the greatest mean distance of any of these small bodies from the sun.

     When they were so near that the disk was plainly visible to the unaided eye, Hilda passed between them and Jupiter, eclipsing it. To their surprise, the light was not instantly shut off, as when the moon occults a star, but there was evident refraction.

     "By George!" said Bearwarden, "here is an asteroid that has an atmosphere."

     There was no mistaking it. They soon discovered a small ice-cap at one pole, and then made out oceans and continents, with mountains, forests, rivers, and green fields. The sight lasted but a few moments before they swept by, but they secured several photographs, and carried a vivid impression in their minds. Hilda appeared to be about two hundred miles in diameter.

     "How do you account for that living world," Bearwarden asked Cortlandt, "on your theory of size and longevity?"

     "There are two explanations," replied Cortlandt, if the theory, as I still believe, is correct. Hilda has either been brought to this system from some other less matured, in the train of a comet, and been captured by the immense power of "Jupiter, which might account for the eccentricity of its orbit, or some accident has happened to rejuvenate it here. A collision with another minor planet moving in an orbit that crossed its own, or with the head of a large comet, would have reconverted it into a star, perhaps after it had long been cold. A comet may

     That afternoon Ayrault brought out some statistical tables he had compiled from a great number of books, and also a diagram of the comparative sizes of the planets. "I have been not a little puzzled at the discrepancies between even the best authors," he said, "scarcely any two being exactly alike, while every decade has seen accepted theories radically changed." Saying which, he spread out the result of his labours (shown on the following pages), which the three friends then studied.

     "You see," Ayrault explained, "on Jupiter we shall need our apergetic outfits to enable us to make long marches, while on Saturn they will not be necessary, the increase in our weight as a result of that planet's size being considerably less than the usual load carried by the Roman soldier."

     "I do not imagine," said Cortlandt, "we should long be troubled by gravitation without our apergetic outfits even on Jupiter, for, though our weight will be more than doubled, we can take off one quarter of the whole by remaining near the equator, their rapid rotation having apparently been given providentially to all the large planets. Nature will adapt herself to this change, as to all others, very readily. Although the reclamation of the vast areas of the North American Arctic Archipelago, Alaska, Siberia, and Antarctic Wilkes Land, from the death-grip of the ice in which they have been held will relieve the pressure of population for another century, at the end of that time it will surely be felt again; it is therefore a consolation to feel that the mighty planets Jupiter and Saturn, which we are coming to look upon as our heritage, will not crush the life out of any human beings by their own weight that may alight upon them."

     Before going to bed that evening they decided to be up early the next day, to study Jupiter, which was already a brilliant object.

     The following morning, on awakening, they went at once to their observatory, and found that Jupiter's

     They then prepared to check the Callisto's headlong speed, which Jupiter's attraction was beginning to increase. When about two million miles from the great planet, which was considerably on their left, they espied Callisto ahead and slightly on their right, as Deepwaters had calculated it would be. Applying a mild repulsion to this -- which was itself quite a world, with its diameter of over three thousand miles, though evidently as cold and dead as the earth's old moon -- they retarded their forward rush, knowing that the resulting motion towards Jupiter would be helped by the giant's pull. Wishing to be in good condition for their landing, they divided the remainder of the night into watches, two going to sleep at a time, the man on duty standing by to control the course and to get photographic negatives, on which, when they were developed, they found two crescent-shaped continents, a speckled region, and a number of islands. By 7 A. M., according to Eastern standard time, they were but fifty thousand miles from Jupiter's surface, the gigantic globe filling nearly one side of the sky. In preparation for a sally, they got their guns

     They saw they should alight in a longitude on which the sun had just risen, the rocky tops of the great mountains shining like helmets in its rays. Soon they felt a sharp checking of their forward motion, and saw, from the changed appearance of the stars and the sun, that they had entered the atmosphere of their new home.

     Not even did Columbus, standing at the prow of the Santa Maria, with the New World before him, feel the exultation and delight experienced by these latter-day explorers of the twenty-first century. Their first adventures on landing the reader already knows.

     When they awoke, the flowers were singing with the volume of a cathedral organ, the chant rising from all around them, and the sun was already above the horizon. Finding a deep natural spring, in which the water was at about blood-heat, they prepared for breakfast by taking a bath, and then found they had brought nothing to eat.

     "It was stupid of us not to think of it," said Bearwarden, "yet it will be too much out of our way to return to the Callisto."

     "We have two rifles and a gun," said Ayrault, "and have also plenty of water, and wood for a fire. All we need is game."

     "The old excuse, that it has been already shot out, cannot hold here," said Cortlandt.

     "Seeing that we have neither wings nor pneumatic

     "The question is," said the professor, "whether the game like warm water. If we can follow this stream till it has been on the surface for some time, or till it spreads out, we shall doubtless find a huntsman's paradise."

     "A bright idea," said Bearwarden. "Let's have our guns ready, and, as old Deepwaters would say, keep our weather eye open."

     The stream flowed off in a southeasterly direction, so that by following it they went towards the volcanoes.

     "It is hard to realize," said the professor, that those mountains must be several hundred miles away, for the reason that they are almost entirely above the horizon. This apparent flatness and wide range of vision is of course the result of Jupiter's vast size. With sufficiently keen sight, or aided by a good glass, there is no reason why one should

     "It is surprising," said Ayrault, "that in what is evidently Jupiter's Carboniferous period the atmosphere should be so clear. Our idea has been that at that time on earth the air was heavy and dense."

     "So it was, and doubtless is here," replied Cortlandt; "but you must remember that both those qualities would be given it by carbonic-acid gas, which is entirely invisible and transparent. No gas that would be likely to remain in the air would interfere with sight; water vapour is the only thing that could; and though the crust of this planet, even near the surface, is still hot, the sun being so distant, the vapour would not be, raised much. By avoiding low places near hot springs, we shall doubtless have very nearly as clear an atmosphere as on earth. What does surprise me is the ease with which we breathe. I can account for it only by supposing that, the Carboniferous period being already well advanced, most of the carbonic acid is already locked up in the forests or in Jupiter's coal-beds."

     "How, asked Bearwarden, "do you account for the `great red spot' that appeared here in 1878,

     "That has puzzled me very much," replied Cortlandt, "but I never believed the explanation then given was correct. The Carboniferous period is essentially one of great forest growth; so there would be nothing out of the way in supposing the spot, notwithstanding its length of twenty-seven thousand miles and its breadth of eight thousand miles, to have been forest. It occurred in what would correspond to the temperate region on earth. Now, though the axis of this planet is practically straight, the winds of course change their direction, and so the temperature does vary from day to day. What is more probable than that, owing perhaps to a prolonged norther or cold spell, a long strip of forest lying near the frost line was brought a few degrees below it, so that the leaves changed their colours as they do on earth? It would, it seems to me, be enough to give the surface a distinct colour; and the fact that the spot's greatest length was east and west,

     Though they had walked a considerable distance, the water was not much cooled; and though the stream's descent was so slight that on earth its current would have been very slow, here it rushed along like a mountain torrent, the reason, of course, being that a given amount of water on Jupiter would depress a spring balance 2.55 times as much as on the earth.

     "It is strange," said Ayrault, "that, notwithstanding its great speed, the water remains so hot; you would think its motion would cool it."

     "So it does," answered the professor. "It of course cools considerably more in a given period -- as, for instance, one minute -- than if it were moving more slowly, but on account of its speed it has been exposed to the air but a very short time since leaving the spring."

     Just before them the stream now widened into a narrow lake, which they could see was straight for some distance.

     "The fact is," said Bearwarden, "this water seems in such haste to reach the ocean that it turns

     As the huge ferns and palms grew to the water's edge, they concluded the best way to traverse the lake would be on a raft. Accordingly, choosing a large overhanging palm, Bearwarden and Ayrault fired each an explosive ball into its trunk, about eighteen inches from the ground. One round was enough to put it in the water, each explosion removing several cubic feet of wood. By repeating this process on other trees they soon had enough large timber for buoyancy, so that they had but to superimpose lighter cross-logs and bind the whole together with pliable branches and creepers to form a substantial raft. The doctor climbed on, after which Bearwarden and Ayrault cast off, having prepared long poles for navigating. With a little care they kept their bark from catching on projecting roots, and as the stream continued to widen till it was about one hundred yards across, their work became easy. Carried along at a speed of two or three miles an hour, they now saw that the water and the banks they passed were literally alive with reptiles and all sorts of amphibious creatures, while winged lizards sailed from every over

     "We might almost think we were on earth," said Ayrault, "from the looks of those storks standing on one leg, with the other drawn up, were it not for their size."

     "How do you suppose they defend themselves," asked Bearwarden, "from the snakes with which the water is filled?"

     "I suspect they can give a pretty good account of themselves," replied Cortlandt, "with those teeth. Besides, with only one leg exposed, there is but a very small object for a snake to strike at. For their number and size, I should say their struggle for existence was comparatively mild. Doubtless non-poisonous, or, for that matter, poisonous snakes, form a great part of their diet."

     On passing the bend in the lake they noticed that the banks were slightly higher, while palms, pine-trees, and rubber plants succeeded the ferns. In the distance they now heard a tremendous crashing, which grew louder as the seconds passed. It finally

     He seems to be turning up his nose at us,"

     As the creature moved, his chest struck a huge overhanging palm, tearing it off as though it had been a reed. Brushing it aside with his trunk, he was about to continue his march, when two rifle reports rang out together, rousing the echoes and a number of birds that screeched loudly.

     Bearwarden's bullet struck the mammoth in the shoulder, while Ayrault's aim was farther back. As the balls exploded, a half-barrelful of flesh and hide was shot from each, leaving two gaping holes. Instantly he rushed among the trees, making his course known for some time by his roars. As he turned, Bearwarden fired again, but the hall flew over him, blowing off the top of a tree.

     "Now for the chase!" said Ayrault. "There would be no excuse for losing him."

     Quickly pushing their raft to shore and securing it to the bank, the three jumped off. Thanks to their rubber boots and galvanic outfits which automatically kept them charged, they were as spry as they would have been on earth. The ground all about them, and in a strip twelve feet wide where the

     "The most highly developed things we have seen here," said Bearwarden, "are the flowers and fireflies, most of the birds and amphibians being simply loathsome."

     As they proceeded they found tracks of blood, which were rapidly attracting swarms of the reptile birds and snakes, which, however, as a rule, fled at their approach.

     "I wonder what can have caused that mammoth to move so fast, and to have seemed so ill at ease?" said the doctor. "His motive certainly was not thirst, for he did not approach the water in a direct line, neither did he drink on reaching it. One would think nothing short of an earthquake or a land-slide could trouble him."

     "There can be no land-slide here," said Ayrault, for the country is too flat."

     "And after yesterday's eruptions," added Bearwarden, "it would seem as though the volcanoes could have scarcely enough steam left to make trouble."

     The blood-tracks, continuing to become fresher, showed them they were nearing the game, when suddenly the trail took a sharp turn to the right, even returning towards the lake. A little farther it took another sharp turn, then followed a series of doublings, while still farther the ground was completely denuded of trees, its torn-up and trampled condition and the enormous amount of still warm blood showing how terrific a battle had just taken place.

     While they looked about they saw what appeared to be the trunk of a tree about four feet in diameter and six feet long, with a slight crook. On coming closer, they recognized in it one of the forefeet of the mammoth, cut as cleanly as though with a knife from the leg just above the ankle, and still warm. A little farther they found the huge trunk cut to slivers, and, just beyond, the body of the unfortunate beast with three of its feet gone, and the thick hide

     The three hunters then surveyed the scene. The largest and most powerful beast they had believed could exist lay before them dead, not from the bite of a snake or any other poison, but from mechanical injuries of which those they had inflicted formed but a very small part, and literally cut to pieces.

     "I am curious to see the animal," said Cortlandt, "capable of doing this, though nothing short of dynamite bombs would protect us from him."

     "As he has not stopped to eat his victim," said Bearwarden, "it is fair to suppose he is not carnivorous, and so must have had some other motive than hunger in making the attack; unless we can suppose that our approach frightened him away, which, with such power as he must possess, seems unlikely. Let us see," he continued, "parts of two legs remain unaccounted for. Perhaps, on account of their shape, he has been able the more easily to carry or roll them off, for we know that elephant foot makes a capital dish."

     "From the way you talk," said Cortlandt, "one

     "There is no indication here of teeth," said Bearwarden, "each foot being taken off with a clean cut. Besides, we are coming to believe that man existed on earth during the greater part, if not the whole, of our Carboniferous period."

     We must reserve our decision pending further evidence, said Cortlandt.

     "I vote we take the heart," said Ayrault, "and cook it, since otherwise the mammoth will be devoured before our eyes."

     While Bearwarden and Ayrault delved for this, Cortlandt, with some difficulty, parted the mammoth's lips and examined the teeth. "From the conical projections on the molars," said he, "this should be classed rather as a mastodon than as a mammoth."

     When the huge heart was secured, Bearwarden arranged slices on sharpened sticks, while Ayrault set about starting a fire. He had to use Cortlandt's gun to clear the dry wood of snakes, which, attracted doubtless by the dead mastodon, came in such numbers that they covered the ground, while huge pterodactyls, more venomous-looking than the reptiles, hovered about the opening above.

     Arranging a double line of electric wires in a circle about the mastodon and themselves, they sat down and did justice to the meal, with appetites that might have dismayed the waiting throng. Whenever a snake's head came in contact with one wire, while his tail touched the other, he gave a spasmodic leap and fell back dead. If he happened to fall across the wires, lie immediately began to sizzle, a cloud of smoke arose, and lie was reduced to ashes.

     "Any time that we are short of mastodon or other good game," said Ayrault, "we need not hunger if we are not above grilled snake."

     All laughed at this, and Bearwarden, drawing a whiskey-flask from his pocket, passed it to his friends.

     When we rig our fishing-tackle," he continued, and have fresh fish for dinner, an entree of rattle

     "I suspect we shall have to," replied Ayrault for we shall become so like Thanksgiving turkeys that the Callisto's door will be too small for us."

     While they sat and talked, the flowers and plants about them softly began their song, and, as a visual accompaniment, the fire-flies they had not before noticed twinkled through the forest.

     "My goodness! " exclaimed Cortlandt, "how time goes here! We started to get breakfast, and now it's growing dark."

     Hastily cutting some thick but tender slices from the mastodon, and impaling them with the remains of the heart on a sharpened stake, they took up the wires, and the battery that had been supplying the current, and retraced their steps by the way they had come. Their rubber-lined cowhide boots protected them from all but the largest snakes, and as these were for the most part already enjoying their gorge, they trampled with impunity on those that remained in their path. When they had covered about half

     "Are you hurt?" asked Bearwarden, helping him up.

     "Not in the least," replied Cortlandt. "What surprises me is that I am not. The weight of that boa-constrictor would be very great on earth, and here I should think it would be simply crushing."

     Groping their way through the rapidly growing darkness, they reached the raft without further adventure, and, once on the lake, had plenty of light. Two moons, one at three quarters and the other full, shone brightly, while the water was alive with gymnotuses and other luminous creatures. Sitting and living upon the cross-timbers, they looked up at the sky. The Great Bear and the north star had exactly the same relation to each other as when seen from the earth, while the other constellations and the

     "How pretty they are!" said Cortlandt, as they watched them. "For bodies consisting of marsh gas, they hold together wonderfully."

     Presently one alighted on the water near them. It was considerably brighter than any glow-worm, and somewhat larger than an arc lamp, being nearly three feet in diameter; it did not emit much light, but would itself have been visible from a considerable distance. Cortlandt tried to touch it with a raft-pole, but could not reach far enough. Presently a large fish approached it, swimming near the surface of the water. When it was close to the Jack-o'-lantern, or whatever it was, there was a splash, the fish turned up its white under side, and, the breeze being away from the raft, the fire-ball and its victim slowly floated off together. There were frequently a dozen of these great globules in sight at once, rising and descending, the observers noticing one peculiarity, viz., that their brightness increased as they rose, and decreased as they sank.

     About two and a half hours after sunset, or midnight according to Jupiter time, they fell asleep, but about an hour later Cortlandt was awakened by a weight on his chest. Starting up, he perceived a huge white-faced bat, with its head but a few inches from his. Its outstretched wings were about eight feet across, and it fastened its sharp claws upon him.

     "This evidently belongs to the blood-sucking species," said Cortlandt. "I seem to be the target for all these beasts, and henceforth shall keep my eyes open at night."

     As day would break in but little over an hour, they decided to remain awake, and they pushed the dead bat overboard, where it was soon devoured by fishes. A chill had come upon the air, and the incessant noise of the forms of life about them had in a measure ceased.

     Cortlandt passed around a box of quinine as a preventive against malaria, and again they lay back and looked at the stars. The most splendid sight in their sky now was Saturn. At the comparatively short distance this great planet was from them, it cast a distinct shadow, its vast rings making it appear twice its real size. With the first glimmer of dawn, the fire-balls descended to the surface of the

     The stream had left the forest and swamp, and was now flowing through open country between high banks. Pushing the raft ashore, they stepped off on the sand, and, warming up the remains of the mastodon's heart, ate a substantial breakfast.

     While washing their knives in the stream preparatory to leaving it -- for they wished to return to the Callisto by completing the circle they had begun -- they noticed a huge flat jelly-fish in shallow water. It was so transparent that they could see the sandy bottom through it. As it seemed to be asleep, Bearwarden stirred up the water around it and poked it with a stick. The jelly-fish first drew itself together till it touched the surface of the water, being nearly round, then it slowly left the stream and rose till it was wholly in the air, and, notwithstanding the sunlight, it emitted a faint glow.

     "Ah!" exclaimed Bearwarden, "here we have

     "It is incomprehensible to me," said Cortlandt, how it maintains itself; for it has neither wings nor visible means of support, yet, as it was able to immerse itself in the stream, thereby displacing a volume of liquid equivalent to its bulk, it must be at least as heavy as water."

     The jelly-fish remained poised in the air until directly above them, when it began to descend.

     "Stand from under!" cried Bearwarden, stepping back. "I, for one, should not care to be touched."

     The great soft mass came directly over the spot on which they had been standing, and stopped its descent about three feet from the ground, parallel to which it was slowly carried by the wind. A few yards off, in the direction in which it was moving, lay a long black snake asleep on the sand. When directly over its victim the jelly globule again sank till it touched the middle of the reptile's back. The serpent immediately coiled itself in a knot, but was already dead. The jellyfish did not swallow, but completely surrounded its prey, and again rose in the air, with the snake's black body clearly visible within it.

     Our Will-o'-the-wisp is prettier by night than by day," said Bearwarden. "I suggest that we investigate this further."

     "How?" asked Cortlandt.

     "By destroying its life," replied Bearwarden. Give it one barrel from your gun, doctor, and see if it can then defy gravitation."

     Accordingly Cortlandt took careful aim at the object, about twenty-yards away, and fired. The main portion of the jellyfish, with the snake still in its embrace, sailed away, but many pounds of jelly fell to the ground. Most of this remained where it had fallen, but a few of the larger pieces showed a faint luminosity and rose again.

     "You cannot kill that which is simply a mass of protoplasm," said Cortlandt. "Doubtless each of those pieces will form a new organism. This proves that there are ramifications and developments of life which we never dreamed of."

     They calculated that they had come ten or twelve miles from the place at which they built the raft, while the damp salt breeze blowing from the south showed them they were near the ocean. Concluding that large bodies of water must be very much alike on all planets, they decided to make for a range of hills due north and a few miles off, and to complete the circuit of the square in returning to the Callisto. The soft wet sand was covered with huge and curious tracks, doubtless made by creatures that had come to the stream during the night to drink, and they noticed with satisfaction as they set out that the fresher ones led off in the direction in which they were going. For practice, they blew off the heads of the boa-constrictors as they hung from the trees, and of the other huge snakes that moved along the

     The ground continued to be marked with very large footprints. Often the impressions were those of a biped like some huge bird, except that occasionally the creature had put down one or both forefeet, and a thick tail had evidently dragged nearly all the time it walked erect. Presently, coming to

     "Twenty-four people could dine at a table of this size with ease," said Bearwarden, "while it would make soup for a regiment. I wonder if it belongs to the snapping or diamond-backed species."

     At this juncture the monster again moved.

     "As it is heading in our direction," resumed Bearwarden, "I vote we strike for a free pass," and, taking a run, he sprang with his spiked boots upon the turtle's shell and clambered upon the flat top, which was about six feet from the ground. He was quickly followed by Ayrault, who was not much ahead of Cortlandt, for, notwithstanding his fifty years, the professor was very spry. The tortoise was almost the exact counterpart of the Glyptodon asper that formerly existed on earth, and shambled along at a jerky gait, about half as fast again as they could walk, and while it continued to go in their direction they were greatly pleased. They soon found that by dropping the butts of their rifles sharply and simultaneously

     "It is strange," said Ayrault, "that, with the exception of the mastodon and this tortoise, we have seen none of the monsters that seem to appear at the close of Carboniferous periods, although the ground is covered with their tracks."

     "Probably we did not reach the grounds at the right time of day," replied Bearwarden. "The large game doubtless stays in the woods and jungles till night."

     "I fancy," said Cortlandt, "we shall find representatives of all the species that once lived upon the earth. In the case of the singing flowers and the Jack-o'-lantern jelly-fish, we have, in addition, seen developments the existence of which no scientist has ever before even suspected."

     Occasionally the tortoise stopped, whereupon they poked it from behind with their knives. It was a vicious-looking brute, and had a huge horny beak, with which it bit off young trees that stood in its way as though they had been blades of grass. They were passing through a valley about half a mile wide,

     "How I wish we could take a pair of those creatures with us when we return to the earth!" said Cortlandt.

     "They would be trump cards," replied Bearwarden, "in a zoological garden or a dime museum, and would take the wind out of the sails of all the other freaks."

     As they lay flat on the turtle's back, the monsters gazed at them unconcernedly, munching the palm-

     "Having nothing to fear from a tortoise," resumed Cortlandt, "they may allow us to stalk them. We are in their eyes like hippocentaurs, except that we are part of a tortoise instead of part of a horse, or else they take us for a parasite or fibrous growth on the shell."

     "They would not have much to fear from us as we really are," replied Bearwarden, "were it not for our explosive bullets."

     "I am surprised," said Ayrault, "that graminivorous animals should be so heavily armed as these, since there can be no great struggle in obtaining their food."

      "From the looks of their jaws," replied Cortlandt, "I should say they are omnivorous, and would doubtless prefer meat to what they are eating now. Something seems to have gone wrong with the animal creation hereabouts to-day."

     Their war-horse clanked along like a badly rusted machine, approaching the dinosaurs obliquely. When only about fifty yards intervened, as the hunters were preparing to aim, their attention was diverted by a

     "The animals here," said Bearwarden, "behave as though they were going to catch a train; only our friend beneath us seems superior to haste."

     "I would give a good deal to know," said Cortlandt, "what is pursuing those giants, and whether it is identical or similar to the mutilator of the mastodon. Nothing but abject terror could make them run like that."

     "I have a well-formed idea," said Bearwarden, "that a hunt is going on, with no doubt two parties, one in the woods on either side, and that the hunters may be on a scale commensurate with that of their victims."

     "If the excitement is caused by men," replied Cortlandt, "our exploration may turn out to be a far more difficult undertaking than we anticipated. But why, if there are men in those woods, do they not show themselves? -- for they could certainly keep pace with the game more easily in the open than among the trees."

     "Because," replied Bearwarden, "the men in the woods are doubtless the beaters, whose duty it is to drive the game into and up the valley, at the end of which the killing will be done."

     "We may have a chance to see it," said Ayrault, "or to take a hand, for we are travelling straight in that direction, and shall be able to give a good account ourselves if our rights are challenged."

     "Why," asked Cortlandt, "if the hunting parties that have been in our vicinity were only beaters, should they have mutilated the mastodon in such it way that he could not walk? And how were they

     It was obvious to them that tortoises were not much troubled by the apparently general foe, for the specimen in which they were just then interested continued his course entirely unconcerned. Soon, however, he seemed to feel fatigue, for he drew his feet and head within his shell, which he tightly closed, and after that no poking or prodding had the desired effect.

     "I suspect we must depend on shank's mares for a time," said Bearwarden, cheerfully, as they scrambled down.

     "We can now see," said Cortlandt, "why our friend was so unconcerned, since he has but to draw himself within himself to become invulnerable to anything short of a stroke of lightning; for no bird could have power enough to raise and drop him from a great height upon rocks, as the eagles do on earth."

     "I suspect, if anxious for turtle soup," said Bearwarden, "we must attach a lightning -- rod, and wait for a thunderstorm to electrocute him."

     Feeling grateful to the huge tortoise for the good service he had rendered, they shot a number of the great snakes that were gliding about on the ground, and placed them where he would find them on awaiting. They then picked their way carefully towards stretches on which the grass was shortest. When they had gone about two miles, and had already reached higher ground, they came to a ridge of rock running at right angles to their course. This they climbed, and on looking over the edge of the crest beheld a sight that made their hearts stand still. A monster, somewhat resembling an alligator, except that the back was arched, was waddling about perhaps seventy-five yards from them. It was sixty feet long, and to the top of its scales was at least twenty-five feet high. It was constantly moving, and

     "It is also a dinosaur," said the professor, watching it sharply, "and very closely resembles the Stegosaurus ungulatus restored in the museums. The question is, What shall we do with the living specimen, now that we have it?"

     "Our chairman," said Ayrault, "must find a way to kill it, so that we may examine it closely."

     "The trouble is," said Bearwarden, "our bullets will explode before they penetrate the scales. In the absence of any way of making a passage for an explosive ball by means of a solid one, we must strike a vital spot. His scales being no harder than the trunk of a tree, we can wound him terribly by touching him anywhere; but there is no object in doing this unless we can kill him, especially as there is no deep stream, such as would have delayed the mastodon in reaching us, to protect us here. We must spread out so as to divert his attention from one to another."

     After some consultation it was decided that Cortlandt, who had only a shot-gun, should remain where

     "We have killed it at last," said Bearwarden but the first attack, though artistic, had not the

     They then reloaded their weapons and, while Cortlandt examined their victim from a naturalist's point of view, Bearwarden and Ayrault secured the heart, which they thought would be the most edible part, the operation being rendered possible by the amount of armour the explosive balls had stripped off.

     "To-morrow," said Bearwarden, "we must make it a point to get some well-fed birds; for I can roast, broil, or fricassee them to a turn. Life is too short to live on this meat in such a sportsman's paradise. In any case there can be no end of mastodons, mammoths, woolly rhinoceroses, moa birds, and all such shooting."

     As the sun was already near the horizon, they chose a dry, sandy place, to secure as much immunity as possible from nocturnal visits, and, after pro

     "Their lights," said Bearwarden, pointing to them, are not as fine as the jelly-fish Will-o'-the wisps were last night, but they are not so dangerous. No gymnotus or electric eel that I have ever seen compared with them, and I am convinced that any one of us they might have touched would have been in kingdom come."

     The balmy air soothed the travellers' brows as they reclined against mounds of sand, while the flowers in the valley sent up their dying notes. One by one the moons arose, till four -- among them the Lilliputian, discovered by Prof. Barnard in 1893 -- were in the sky, flooding the landscape with their silvery light, and something in the surroundings touched a sympathetic cord in the men.

     "Oh that I were young again," said Cortlandt,

     You remember," replied Bearwarden, "how Cicero defends old age in his De Senectute, and shows that while it has almost everything that youth has, it has also a sense of calm and many things besides."

     "Yes," answered Cortlandt, "but, while plausible, it does not convince. The pleasures of age are largely negative, the old being happy when free from pain."

     "Since the highest joy of life," said Ayrault, "is coming to know our Creator, I should say the old, being further advanced, would be the happier of the two. I should never regard this material life as greatly to be prized for itself. You remember the old song:

      "`O Youth! When we come to consider

      The pain, the toil, and the strife,

      The happiest man of all is

      The one who has finished his life.'

     "I suspect," continued Ayrault, "that the man who reaches even the lowest plane in paradise will find far more beautiful visions than any we have here."

     As they had but little rest the night before, they were all tired. The warm breeze swayed the long dry grass, causing it to give out a soft rustle; all birds except the flitting bats were asleep among the tall ferns or on the great trees that spread their branches towards heaven. There was nothing to recall a picture of the huge monsters they had seen that day, or of the still more to be dreaded terror these had borne witness to. Thus night closes the activities of the day, and in its serene grandeur the soul has time to think. While they thought, however, drowsiness overcame them, and in a little while all were asleep.

     The double line of protection-wires encircled them like a silent guard, while the methodical ticking of the alarm-clock that was to wake them at the approach of danger, and register the hour of interruption, formed a curious contrast to the irregular cries of the night-hawks in the distance. Time and again some huge iguanodon or a hipsohopus would

     Shortly before dawn there was an unusually heavy step. A moment later the ever-vigilant batteries poured forth their current, and the clang of the alarm-bell made the still night ring. In an instant the three men were awake, each resting on one knee, with their backs towards the centre and

     "A plague on my shot-gun!" said Cortlandt. "Had I known how much of this kind of game we should see, I too should have brought a rifle."

     The monster was entangled in the wires, and in another second would have stepped on the batteries that were still causing the bell to ring.

     "Aim for the heart," said Bearwarden to Ayrault. "When you show me his ribs, I will follow you in the hole."

     Ayrault instantly fired for a point just back of the left foreleg. The explosion had the same effect as on the mastodon, removing a half-barrel of hide, etc; and the next second Bearwarden sent a bullet less than an inch from where Ayrault's had stopped. Before the colossus could turn, each had caused several explosions in close proximity to the

     "The sun is about to rise," said Bearwarden; in a few minutes we shall have enough light."

     They cut out a dozen thick slices of tenderloin steak, and soon were broiling and eating a substantial breakfast.

     "There are not as many spectators to watch us eat here," said Cortlandt, "as in the woods. I suggest that, after returning to camp for our blankets and things, we steer for the Callisto, via this Triceratops, to see what creatures have been attracted by the body."

     On finishing their meal they returned to the place at which they had passed the night. Having straightened the protection-wires, which had become twisted, and arranged their impedimenta, they set out, and were soon once more beside their latest victim.

     At first nothing seemed to have been disturbed, when they suddenly perceived that both forelegs were missing. On further examination they found that the ponderous tail, seven feet in diameter, was cut through in two places, the thicker portion having disappeared, and that the heavy bones in this extremity of the vertebral column had been severed like straws. The cut surfaces were but little cooler than the interior of the body, showing how recently the mutilation had been effected.

     "By all the gods!" exclaimed Bearwarden, "it is easy to see the method in this; the hunters have again cut off only those parts that could be easily rolled. These Jovian fellows must have weapons compared with which the old scythe chariots would be but toys, with which they amputate the legs of

     "I see no depression such as such heavy bodies would necessarily have made had they been rolled along the ground, neither does it seem to me that these curious tracks in the sand are those of men."

     The loose earth looked as if the cross-ties of some railroad had been removed, the space formerly occupied having been but partly filled, and these depressions were across the probable direction of motion.

     "Whatever was capable of chasing mastodons and carrying such weights," said Ayrault, "will, I suspect, have little to fear from us. Probably nothing short of light artillery would leave much effect."

     "I dare say," replied Bearwarden, "we had better give the unknown quantity a wide berth, though I would give a year's salary to see what it is like. The absence of other tracks shows that his confreres leave `Scissor-jaw' alone."

     Keeping a sharp lookout in all directions, they

     While in quest of fire-wood, they came upon great heaps of bones, mostly those of birds, and were attracted by the tall, bell-shaped flowers growing luxuriantly in their midst. These exhaled a most delicious perfume, and at the centre of each flower was a viscous liquid, the colour of honey.

     "If this tastes as well as it looks," said Bearwarden, "it will come in well for dessert"; saying which he thrust his finger into the recesses of the flower, intending to taste the essence. Quietly, but

     "Ha!" he exclaimed, "a sensitive and you may almost say a man-eating plant. This doubtless has been the fate of these birds, whose bones now lie bleaching at its feet after they have nourished its lips with their lives. No doubt the plant has use for them still, since their skeletons may serve to fertilize its roots."

     Wishing to investigate further, Bearwarden placed one of the birds they had shot within the bell of another flower, which immediately contracted with such force that they saw drops of blood squeezed out. After some minutes the flower opened, as beautiful as ever, and discharged an oblong ball compressed to about the size of a hen's egg, though the bird that was placed within it had been as large as a small duck. Towards evening these flowers sent up their most beautiful song, to hear which flocks of birds came from far and near, alighting on the trees, and many were lured to death by the siren strains and the honey.

     Before resuming their journey, the travellers paid

     "The wonder to me," said Bearwarden, "is, that these snakes do not protect the game, by keeping it from the life-devouring plants. It may be that they do not show themselves by day or when the victims are near, or that the quadrupeds on which these

     Shortly after midnight they rested for a half hour, but the dawn found them trudging along steadily, though somewhat wearily, and having about completed the third side of their square. Accordingly, they soon made a right-angle turn to the left, and had been picking their way over the rough ground for nearly two hours, with the sun already high in the sky, when they noticed a diminution of light. Glancing up, they saw that one of the moons was passing across the sun, and that they were on the eve of a total eclipse.

     "Since all but the fifth moon," said Cortlandt, "revolve exactly in the plane of Jupiter's equator, any inhabitants that settle there will become accustomed to eclipses, for there must be one of the sun, and also of the moons, at each revolution, or about forty-five hundred in every Jovian year. The reason we have seen none before is, because we are not exactly on the equator."

     They had a glimpse of the coronal streamers as the

     "This reminds me," said Bearwarden, "of the old lady who never completed her preparations for turning in without searching for burglars under the bed. Finally she found one, and exclaimed in delight, `I've been looking for you fifty years, and at last you are here!' The question is, now that we have found our burglar, what shall we do with him?"

     "I constantly regret not having a rifle," replied Cortlandt, "though it is doubtful if even that would help us here."

     "Let us sit down and wait," said Ayrault; "there may be an opening soon."

     Anon a woolly rhinoceros, resembling the Rhinoceros tichorhinus that existed contemporaneously on earth with the mammoth, came to drink the water that had partly cooled. It was itself a formidable-looking beast, but in an instant the monster again rushed from concealment with the same tremendous speed. The rhinoceros turned in the direction of the sound, and, lowering its head, faced the foe. The ant's shears, however, passed beneath the horn, and, fastening upon the left foreleg, cut it off with a loud snap.

     "Now is our chance," exclaimed Cortlandt; "we may kill the brute before he is through with the rhinoceros."

     "Stop a bit, doctor," said Bearwarden. "We have a good record so far; let us keep up our reputation for being sports. Wait till he can attend to us."

     The encounter was over in less than a minute, three of the rhinoceros's legs being taken off, and the head almost severed from the body. Taking up the legs in its mandibles, the murderous creature was returning to its lair, when, with the cry of "Now for

     "This has been by all odds the most exciting

     "Anything short of explosive bullets," added Bearwarden, "would have been powerless against this beast, for the armour in many places is nearly a foot thick."

     "This is also the most extraordinary as well as most dangerous creature with which we have, had to deal," said Cortlandt, because it is an enormously enlarged insect, with all the inherent ferocity and strength. It is almost the exact counterpart of an African soldier-ant magnified many hundred thousand times. I wonder," he continued thoughtfully, "if our latter-day insects may not be the deteriorated (in point of size) descendants of the monsters of mythology and geology, for nothing could be a more terrible or ferocious antagonist than many of our well-known insects, if sufficiently enlarged. No animal now alive has more than a small fraction of the strength, in proportion to its size, of the minutest spider or flea. It may be that through lack of food, difficulties imposed by changing climate, and the necessity

     "I think," said Bearwarden, "it will be the part of wisdom to return to the Callisto, and do the rest of our exploring on Jupiter from a safe height; for, though we succeeded in disabling this beauty, it was largely through luck, and had we not done so we

     Accordingly they proceeded, and were delighted, a few minutes later, to see the sunlight reflected from the projectile's polished roof.

     On reaching the Callisto, Ayrault worked the lock he had had placed on the lower door, which, to avoid carrying a key, was opened by a combination. The car's interior was exactly as they had left it, and they were glad to be in it again.

     "Now," said Bearwarden, "we can have a sound and undisturbed sleep, which is what I want more than anything else. No prowlers can trouble us here, and we shall not need the protection-wires."

     They then opened a window in each side -- for the large glass plates, admitting the sun when closed, made the Callisto rather warm -- and placed a stout wire netting within them to keep out birds and bats, and then, though it was but little past noon, got into their comfortable beds and slept nine hours at a stretch. Their strong metal house was securely at

     The following day at about noon they awoke, and had a bath in the warm pool. They saw the armoured mass of the great ant evidently undisturbed, while the bodies of its victims were already shining skeletons, and raised a small cairn of stones in memory of the struggle they had had there.

     "We should name this place Kentucky," said Bearwarden, "for it is indeed a dark and bloody ground," and, seeing the aptness of the appellation, they entered it so on their charts. While Ayrault got the batteries in shape for resuming work. Bearwarden prepared a substantial breakfast. This consisted

     "This is the last meal we shall take hereabouts," said their cook, as they plied their knives and forks beneath the trees, "so here is a toast to our adventures, and to all the game we have killed." They drained their glasses in drinking this, after which Bearwarden regaled them with the latest concert-hall song which he had at his tongue's end.

     About an hour before dark they re-entered their projectile, and, as a mark of respect to their little ship, named the great branch of the continent on which they had alighted Callisto Point. They then got under way. The batteries had to develop almost their maximum power to overcome Jupiter's attraction; but they were equal to the task, and the Callisto was soon in the air. Directing their apergy to the mountains towards the interior of the continent, and applying repulsion to any ridge or hill over which they passed, thereby easing the work of the batteries engaged in supporting the Callisto, they were soon sweeping along at seventy-five to one hundred miles

     By sunset they had gone a hundred miles. Wishing to push along, they closed the windows, rose higher to avoid any mountain-tops that might be invisible in the moonlight, and increased their speed. The air made a gentle humming sound as they shot through it, and towards morning they saw several bright points of light in which they recognized, by the aid of their glasses, sheets of flame and torrents of molten glowing lava, bursting at intervals or pouring steadily from several volcanoes. >From this they concluded they were again near an ocean, since volcanoes need the presence of a large body of water to provide steam for their eruptions.

     With the rising sun they found the scene of the day before entirely changed. They were over the shore of a vast ocean that extended to the left as far as they could see, for the range of vision often exceeded the power of sight. The coast-line ran almost due north and south, while the volcanoes that dotted it, and that had been luminous during the night, now revealed their nature only by lines of smoke and vapours. They were struck by the boldness and abruptness

     We can account for the absence of ice-action and scratches," said Cortlandt, "in one of two ways. Either the proximity of the internal heat to the surface prevents water from freezing in all latitudes, or Jupiter's axis has always been very nearly perpendicular to its orbit, and consequently the thermometer has never been much below thirty-two degrees Fahrenheit; for, at the considerable distance we are now from the sun, it is easy to conceive that, with the axis much inclined, there might be cold weather, during the Northern hemisphere's winter, that would last for about six of our years, even as near the equator as this. The substantiation of an ice-cap at the pole

     Comparing this land with the photographs we took from space, I should say it is the eastern of the two crescent-shaped continents we found apparently facing each other. Their present form I take to be only the skeleton outline of what they will be at the next period of Jupiter's development. They will, I predict, become more like half moons than crescents, though the profile may be much indented by gulfs and bays, their superficial area being greatly increased, and the intervening ocean correspondingly

     "Perhaps a more striking proof of this than are the remains of fishes and marine life that are found there, is the dearth of natural harbours and indentations in Africa's northern coast, while just opposite, in southern Europe, there are any number; which shows that not enough time has elapsed since Africa's upheaval for liquid or congealed water to produce them. Many of Europe's best harbours, and Boston's, in our country, have been dug out by slow

     Four days later, after crossing a ridge of mountains that the pressure on the aneroid barometer showed to be about thirty-two thousand feet high, and a stretch of flat country a few miles in width, they came to a great arm of the sea. It was about thirty miles wide at its mouth, which was narrowed like the neck of a bottle, and farther inland was over one hundred miles across, and though their glasses, the clear air, and the planet's size enabled them to see nearly five hundred miles, they could not find its end. In the shallow water along its shores, and on the islands rising but a few feet above the waves, they saw all kinds of amphibians and sea-monsters. Many of these were almost the exact reproduction in life of the giant plesiosaurs, dinosaurs, and elasmosaurs, whose remains are preserved in the museums

     "Man in his natural state," said Cortlandt, would have but small chance of surviving long among such neighbours. Buckland, I think, once indulged in the jeu d'esprit of supposing an ichthyosaur lecturing on the human skull. `You will at once perceive,' said the lecturer, `that the skull before us belonged to one of the lower order of animals. The teeth are very insignificant, the power of the jaws trifling, and altogether it seems wonderful how the creature could have procured food.' Armed with modern weapons, and in this machine, we are, of course, superior to the most powerful monster; but it is not likely that, had man been so surrounded during the whole of his evolution, he could have reached his present plane."

     Notwithstanding the striking similarity of these creatures to their terrestrial counterparts that existed on earth during its corresponding period, there

     "The adaptability and economy of Nature," said Cortlandt, "have always amazed me. In the total blackness of the Kentucky Mammoth Cave, where eyes would be of no use to the fishes, our common mother has given them none; while if there is any light, though not as much as we are accustomed to, she may be depended upon to rise to the occasion by increasing the size of the pupil and the power of the eye. In the development of the ambulatory muscles we again see her handiwork, probably brought about through the `survival of the fittest.' The fishes and those wholly immersed need no increase in power, for, though they weigh more than they would on earth, the weight of the water they displace is increased at the same rate also, and their buoyancy remains unchanged. If the development of life here so closely follows its lines on earth, with the exception of comparatively slight modifications, which are exactly what, had we stopped to think,

     Before leaving Deepwaters Bay they secured a pail of its water, which they found, on examination, contained a far larger percentage of salt and solid material than the oceans on earth, while a thermometer that they immediately immersed in it soon registered eighty-five degrees Fahrenheit; both of which discoveries confirmed them in what they already knew, namely, that Jupiter had advanced comparatively little from the condition in which the water on the surface is hot, in which state the earth once was.

     They were soon beyond the estuary at which

     "Gravity is a useful factor here," observed Cortlandt, as they made a note of this; "for, in addition to giving immunity from waves, it is most effective in checking the elevation of high mountains or table-lands in the high latitudes, which we shall doubtless find sufficiently cool, or even cold, while in tropical regions, which might otherwise be too hot, it interferes with them least, on account of being partly neutralized by the rapid rotation with which all four of the major planets are blessed."

     At sunrise the following morning they saw they were approaching another great arm of the sea. It was over a thousand miles wide at its mouth, and, had not the photographs showed the contrary, they would have thought the Callisto had reached the northern end of the continent. It extended into the land fifteen thousand miles, and, on account of the shape of its mouth, they called it Funnel Bay. Rising to a height, they flew across, and came to a great

     The exposed points on the plateau, as also the summits of the first mountains they had seen before alighting, were devoid of vegetation, scarcely so much as a blade of grass being visible. Since they could not account for this by cold, they concluded that the most probable explanation lay in the tremendous hurricanes

     On reaching the northern coast of the peninsula they increased their elevation and changed their course to northeast, not caring to remain long over the great body of water, which they named Cortlandt Bay. The thousands of miles of foam fast flew beneath them, the first thing attracting their attention being a change in the ocean's colour. In the eastern shore of Cortlandt Bay they soon observed the mouth of a river, ten miles across, from which this tinted water issued in a flood. On account of its colour, which reminded them of a stream they knew so well, they christened it the Harlem.

     Believing that an expedition up its valley might reveal something of interest, they began the ascent, remaining at an elevation of a few hundred feet. For about three hundred miles they followed this river, which had but few bends, while its sides became more and more precipitous, till it flowed through a canon four and a half miles across. Though they knew from the wide discoloration of Cortlandt Bay that the volume of water discharged was tremendous,

     "One would think the end of the world was approaching!" shouted Cortlandt through his hands.

     "Look!" Bearwarden roared back, "the wind is scattering the mist."

     As he spoke, the vapoury curtain was drawn aside, revealing a waterfall of such vast proportions as to dwarf completely anything they had ever seen or even imagined. A somewhat open horseshoe lip, three and a half miles straight across and over four miles following the line of the curve, discharged a

     Finding that they were being rapidly dazed and stunned by the noise, the travellers caused the Callisto to rise rapidly, and were soon surveying the superb sight from a considerable elevation. Their minds could grasp but slowly the full meaning and titanic power of what they saw, and not even the vast falls in their nearness could make their significance clear. Here was a sheet of water three and a half miles wide, averaging forty feet in depth, moving at a rapid rate towards a sheer fall of six hundred feet. They felt, as they gazed at it, that the power of that

     Reluctantly leaving the fascinating spectacle, they pursued their exploration along the river above the falls. For the first few miles the surface of the water was near that of the land; there were occasional rapids, but few rocks, and the foaming torrent moved at great speed, the red sandstone banks of the river being as polished as though they had been waxed. After a while the obstructions disappeared, but the water continued to rush and surge along at a speed of ten or twelve miles an hour, so that it would be easily navigable only for logs or objects moving in one direction. The surface of the river was soon on an average fifty feet below the edge of the banks,

     When they had followed up the river about sixty miles towards its source they came upon what at first had the appearance of an ocean. They knew, however, from its elevation, and the flood coming from it, that the water must be fresh, as they soon found it was. This lake was about three hundred miles wide, and stretched from northeast to southwest. There was rolling land with hills about its shores, and the foliage on the banks was a beautiful shade of bluish purple instead of the terrestrial ubiquitous green.

     When near the great lake's upper end, they passed the mouth of a river on their left side, which, from its volume, they concluded must be the principal source, and therefore they determined to trace it. They found it to be a most beautiful stream, averaging two and a half miles in width, evidently very deep, and with a full, steady current. After proceeding for several hours, they found that the general placidity grew less, the smooth surface occasionally became ruffled by projecting rocks and rapids, and

     During their sojourn on Jupiter they had had but little experience with the tremendous winds that they knew, from reason and observation, must rage in its atmosphere. They now heard them whistling over their heads, and, notwithstanding the protection afforded by the sides of the canon, occasionally received a gust that made the Callisto swerve. They kept on steadily, however, till sunset, at which time it became very dark on account of the high banks, which rose as steeply as the Palisades on the Hudson to a height of nearly a thousand feet. Finding a small island near the eastern bank, they were glad to secure the Callisto there for the night, below the reach of the winds, which they, still heard singing loudly but with a musical note in what seemed to them like the sky.

     "It is incomprehensible to me." said Ayrault, as they sat at dinner, "how the sun, at a distance of four hundred and eighty-three million miles, can raise the amount of water we have here passing us, and compared with which the discharge of the greatest river on earth would be insignificant, to say nothing

     "We must remember," replied Cortlandt, "that many of the conditions are different here from those that exist on earth. We know that some of the streams are warm, and even hot, and that the temperature of Deepwaters Bay, and doubtless that of the ocean also, is considerably higher than ours. This would facilitate evaporation. The density of the atmosphere and the tremendous winds, of which I suspect we may see more later, must also help the sun very much in its work of raising vapour. But the most potent factor is undoubtedly the vast size of the basin that these rivers drain."

     "The great speed at which the atmospheric currents move," said Bearwarden, "coupled with the comparative lowness of the mountain chains and the slight obstruction they offer to their passage, must distribute the rain very thoroughly, notwithstanding the great unbroken area of the continents. There can be no such state of things here as exists in the western part of South America, where the Andes are so high that any east-bound clouds, in crossing them, are shoved up so far into a cold region that all

     "I should not be surprised," said Cortlandt, "if we saw another waterfall to-morrow, though not in the shape of rain. In the hour before we stopped we began to see rapids and protruding rocks. That means that we are coming to a part of the channel that is comparatively new, since the older parts have had time to wear smooth. I take it, then, that we are near the foot of a retreating cascade, which we may hope soon to see. That is exactly the order in which we found smooth water and rapids in river No. 1, which we have named the Harlem."

     After this, not being tired, they used the remaining dark hours for recording their recent adventures.

     With the first light they resumed their journey, and an hour after setting out they sighted, as Cortlandt had predicted, another cloud of vapour. The fall -- for such it proved to be -- was more beautiful than the other, for, though the volume of water was not so great, it fell at one leap, without a break, and at the same tremendous speed, a distance of more than a thousand feet. The canon rang with the echoes, while the spray flew in sheets against the smooth, glistening, sandstone walls. Instead of coming from a river, as the first fall had, this poured at once from the rocky lip, about two miles across, of a lake that was eleven hundred feet above the surging mass in the vale below.

     "It is a thousand pities," said Bearwarden, that this cataract has got so near its source; for, at

     About the shores of this lake they saw rhinoceroses with long thick wool, and herds of creatures that much resembled buffaloes.

     "I do not see," said Bearwarden, "why the identical species should not exist here that till recently, in a geological sense, inhabited the earth. The climate and all other conditions are practically the same on both planets, except a trifling difference in weight, to which terrestrials would soon adapt themselves. We know by spectroscopic analysis that hydrogen, iron, magnesium, and all our best-known substances exist in the sun, and even the stars, while the earth contains everything we have found in meteorites. Then why make an exception of life, instead of supposing that at corresponding periods of development the same living forms inhabit all? It would be assuming the eternal sterilization of the

     "The world of organic life is so much more complex," replied Cortlandt, "than that of the crystal, that it requires great continuity. So far we certainly have seen no men, or anything like them, not even so much as a monkey, though I suppose, according to your reasoning, Jupiter has not advanced far enough to produce even that."

     "Exactly," replied Bearwarden, "for it will require vast periods; and, according to my belief, at least half the earth's time of habitability had passed before man appeared. But we see Jupiter is admirably suited for those who have been developed somewhere else, and it would be an awful shame if we allowed it to lie unimproved till it produces appreciative inhabitants of its own, for we find more to admire in one half-hour than its entire present population during its lifetime. Yet, how magnificent this world is, and how superior in its natural state to ours! The mountainous horns of these crescent-shaped continents protect them and the ocean they enclose from the cold polar marine currents, and in a measure from the icy winds; while the elevated

     "As Jupiter's distance from the sun varies from 506,563,000 miles at aphelion to only 460,013,000 at perihelion, this difference, in connection with even the slight inclination of the axis, must make a slight change in seasons, but as the inclination is practically nothing, almost the entire change results from the difference in distance. This means that the

     They found this lake was about six times the size of Lake Superior, and that several large and small streams ran into its upper end. These had their sources in smaller lakes that were at slightly higher elevations. Though the air was cool, the sun shone brightly, while the ground was covered with flowers resembling those of the northern climes on earth, of all shapes and lines. Twice a day these sent up their song, and trees were covered with buds, and the birds twittered gaily. The streams murmured and bubbled, and all things reminded the travellers of early morning in spring.

     "If anything could reconcile me," said Bearwarden, "to exchange my active utilitarian life for a rustic poetical existence, it would be this place, for it is far more beautiful than anything I have seen on earth. It needs but a Maud Muller and a few cows to complete the picture, since Nature gives us a vision of eternal peace and repose."

     Somehow the mention of Maud Muller, and the delicate and refined flowers, whose perfume he inhaled, brought up thoughts that were never far below the surface in Ayrault's mind. "The place is heavenly enough," said he, "to make one wish to live and

     "Ah! poor chap," said Cortlandt, "you are in love, but you are not to be pitied, for though the thrusts at the heart are sharp, they may be the sweetest that mortals know."

     The following morning they reluctantly left the picturesque shores of Lake Serenity, with their beautiful tints and foliage, and resumed the journey, to explore a number of islands in the ocean in the west, which were recorded on their negatives. Ascending to rarefied air, they saw great chains of mountains, which they imagined ran parallel to the coast, rising to considerable altitudes in the east. The tops of all glistened with a mantle of snow in the sunlight, while between the ridges they saw darker and evidently fertile valleys. They passed, moving northwest, over large and small lakes, all evidently part of the same great system, and continued to sweep along for several days with a beautiful panorama, as varying as a kaleidoscope, spread beneath their eyes. They observed that the character of the country gradually changed. The symmetrically rounded mountains and hills began to show angles, while great slabs of rock

     "Here," said Cortlandt, "we have unmistakable evidence of frost and ice action. The next interesting question is, How recently has denudation occurred? The absence of plant life at the exposed places," he continued, as if lecturing to a class, "can be accounted for here, as nearer the equator, by the violence of the wind; but I greatly doubt whether water will now freeze in this latitude at any season of the year, for, even should the Northern hemisphere's very insignificant winter coincide with the planet's aphelion, the necessary drop from the present temperature would be too great to be at all probable. If, then, it is granted that ice does not form here now, notwithstanding the fact that it has done so, the most plausible conclusion is that the inclination of Jupiter's axis is automatically changing, as we know the earth's has often done. There being nothing incompatible

     "I follow you," said Bearwarden, "and do not see how we could arrive at anything else. From Jupiter's low specific gravity, weighing but little more than an equal bulk of water, I should say the interior must be very hot, or else is composed of light material, for the crust's surface, or the part we see, is evidently about as dense as what we have on earth. These things have puzzled me a good deal, and I have been wondering if Jupiter may not have been formed before the earth and the smaller planets."

     "The discrepancies between even the best authorities," replied Cortlandt, "show that as yet but little has been discovered from the earth concerning Jupiter's real condition. The two theories that try to account for its genesis are the ring theory and the nebulous. We know that the sun is constantly emitting vast volumes of heat and light, and that, with the exception

     "This theory explains the practical uniformity in the chemical composition of all members of this system by assuming that they were all once a part of the same body, and you may say brothers and sisters of the sun, instead of its offspring. It also makes size the only factor determining temperature and density, but of course modified by age, since otherwise Jupiter would have a far less developed crust than that with which we find it. I have always considered the period from the molten condition to that with a crust as comparatively short, which stands to reason, for radiation has then no check; and the period from the formation of the crust, which acts as a blanket, to the death of a planet, as very long. I have not found this view clearly set forth in any of the books I have read, but it seems to me the simplest and most natural explanation. Now, granted that the solar system was once a nebula, on which I think every one will agree -- the same forces that changed it into a system of sun and planets must be at work on fifty-one M. Canum venaticorum, Andromeda, and ninety-nine M. Virginis,

     "If, then, the condition of a nebula or star depends simply on its size, it is reasonable to suppose that Andromeda, Sirius, and all the vast bodies we see, were created at the same time as our system, which involves the necessity of one general and simultaneous creation day. But as Sirius, with its diameter of twelve million miles, must be larger than some of the nebulae will be when equally condensed, we must suppose rather that nebulae are forming and coming into the condition of bright and dead stars, much as apples or pears on a fruit tree are constantly growing and developing, so that the Mosaic description of the creation would probably apply in point of time only to our system, or perhaps to our globe, though the rest will doubtless pass through precisely the same stages. This, I think, I will publish, on our return, as the Cortlandt astronomical doctrine, as the most rational I have seen devised, and one that I think we may safely believe, until, perhaps, through increased knowledge, it can be disproved."

     After they crossed a line of hills that ran at

     They swept along steadily for fifty hours, having bright sunny days and beautifully moonlit nights. They passed over finely rounded hills and valleys and well-watered plains. As they approached the ocean and its level the temperature rose, and there was more moisture in the air. The plants and flowers also increased in size, again resembling some

     "This would be the place to live," said Bearwarden, looking at iron mountains, silver, copper, and lead formations, primeval forests, rich prairies, and regions evidently underlaid with coal and petroleum, not to mention huge beds of aluminum clay, and other natural resources, that made his materialistic mouth water. "It would be joy and delight to develop industries here, with no snow avalanches to clog your railroads, or icy blizzards to paralyze work, nor weather that blights you with sun-strokes and fevers. On our return to the earth we must organize a company to run regular interplanetary lines. We could start on this globe all that is best on our own. Think what boundless possibilities may be before the human race on this planet, which on account of its vast size will be in its prime when our insignificant earth is cold and dead and no longer capable of supporting life! Think also of the indescribable blessing to the congested communities of Europe and America, to find an unlimited outlet here! Mars is already past its prime, and Venus scarcely habitable, but in Jupiter we have a new promised land, compared

     "I see," said Ayrault, "that the possibilities here have no limit; but I do not see how you can compare it to the promised land, since, till we undertook this journey, no one had even thought of Jupiter as a habitable place."

     "I trace the Divine promise," replied Bearwarden, "in what you described to us on earth as man's innate longing and desire to rise, and in the fact that the Almighty has given the race unbounded expansiveness in very limited space. This would look to me as the return of man to the garden of Eden through intellectual development, for here every man can sit under his own vine and fig-tree."

     "It seems to me," said Cortlandt, "that no paradise or heaven described in anything but the Bible compares with this. According to Virgil's description, the joys on the banks of his river Lethe must have been most sad and dreary, the general idleness and monotony apparently being broken only by wrestling matches between the children, while the rest strolled about with laurel wreaths or rested in the shade. The pilot Palinurus, who had been drowned by falling

     "The idleness in the spirit-land of all profane writers," added Bearwarden, "has often surprised me too. Though I have always recommended a certain amount of recreation for my staff -- in fact, more than I have generally had myself -- an excess of it becomes a bore. I think that all real progress comes through thorough work. Why should we assume that progress ceases at death? I believe in the verse that says, `We learn here on earth those things the knowledge of which is perfected in heaven.'"

     "According to that," said Cortlandt, "you will some day be setting the axis of heaven right, for in

     "No," said Bearwarden, bristling up at the way Cortlandt sometimes received his speeches, "it means simply that its development, though perfect so far as it goes, may not be finished, and that we may be the means, as on earth, of helping it along."

     "The conditions constituting heaven," said Ayrault, "may be as fixed as the laws of Nature, though the products of those conditions might, it seems to me, still be forming and subject to modification thereby. The reductio ad absurdum would of course apply if we supposed the work of creation absolutely finished."

     Two days later, on the western horizon, they beheld the ocean. Many of the streams whose sources they had seen when they crossed the divide from the lake basin, and whose courses they had followed, were now rivers a mile wide, with the tide ebbing and rising within them many hundreds of miles from their mouths. When they reached the shore line they found the waves breaking, as on earth, upon the sands, but with this difference: they had before noted the smallness of the undulations compared with the strength of the wind, the result of the water's weight. These waves now reminded them of the behaviour of mercury, or of melted lead when stirred on earth, by the rapidity with which the crests dropped. Though the wind was blowing an on-shore gale, there was but little combing, and when

     When over the surface of the ocean, the voyagers rose to a height of thirty thousand metres, and after twenty-four hours' travelling saw, at a distance of about two hundred miles, what looked like another continent, but which they knew must be an island. On finding themselves above it, they rose still higher to obtain a view of its outlines and compare its shape with that of the islands in the photographs they had had time to develop. The length ran from southeast to northwest. Though crossed by latitude forty, and notwithstanding Jupiter's distance from the sun, the southern side had a very luxuriant vegetation that was almost semi-tropical. This they accounted for by its total immunity from cold, the density of the air at sea-level, and the warm moist breezes it received from the tepid ocean. The climate was about the same as that of the Riviera or of Florida in winter, and there was, of course, no parching summer.

     "This shows me," said Bearwarden, "that a country's climate depends less on the amount of heat

     A Jovian week's explorations disclosed the fact that though the island's general outlines were fairly regular, it had deep-water harbours, great rivers, and land-locked gulfs and bays, some of which penetrated many hundred miles into the interior. It also showed that the island's length was about six thou

     "It is wonderful," said Bearwarden, "how comparatively narrow a body of water can keep different species entirely separate. The island of Sumatra, for instance, is inhabited by marsupials belonging to the distinct Australian type, in which the female, as in the kangaroo, carries the slightly developed young in a pouch; while the Malay peninsula, joined to the mainland, has all the highly developed animals of Asia and the connected land of the Eastern hemisphere, the narrow Malacca Strait being all that has kept marsupials and mammals apart, though the separating power has been increased by the rapid current setting through. This has decreased the chance of creatures carried to sea on drift-wood or

     Before leaving the beautiful sea-girt region beneath them, Cortlandt proposed that it be named after their host, which Bearwarden seconded, whereupon they entered it as Ayrault Island on the charts. After this they rose to a great height, and flew swiftly over three thousand miles of ocean till they came to another island not quite as large as the first. It was four thousand five hundred miles long by something less than three thousand wide, and was therefore about the size of Africa. It had several high ranges of mountains and a number of great rivers and fine harbours, while murmuring, bubbling brooks flowed through its forest glades. There were active volcanoes along the northern coast, and the blue, crimson, and purple lines in the luxuriant foliage were the most beautiful they had ever seen.

     "I propose," said Bearwarden, "that we christen this Sylvialand." This Cortlandt immediately seconded, and it was so entered on the charts.

     "These two islands," said Bearwarden, "may become the centres of civilization. With flying machines and cables to carry passengers and information, and ships of great displacement for the interchange of commodities, there is no limit to their possible development. The absence of large waves will also be very favourable to sea-spiders, which will be able to run at tremendous speeds. The constancy in the eruptions of the volcanoes will offer a great field to Jovian inventors, who will unquestionably be able to utilize their heat for the production of steam or electricity, to say nothing of an inexhaustible supply of valuable chemicals. They may contain the means of producing some force entirely different from apergy, and as superior to electricity as that is to steam. Our earthly volcanoes have been put to slight account because of the long intervals between eruptions."

     After leaving Sylvialand they went westward to the eastern of the two crescent continents. It was separated from the island by about six thousand

     "It would take good navigation or an elaborate system of light-houses," said Bearwarden, "for a captain to find the shortest course through these groups."

     The islands were covered with shade trees much resembling those on earth, and the leaves on many

     "The Jovian trees," said Cortlandt, "can never cease to bear, though the change of seasons is evidently able to turn their colour, perhaps by merely ripening them. When a ripe leaf falls off, its place is doubtless soon taken by a bud, for germination and fructification go on side by side."

     Before leaving, they decided to name this Twentieth Century Archipelago, since so much of the knowledge appertaining to it had been acquired in their own day. At latitude sixty the northern arms of the two continents came within fifteen hundred miles of each other. The eastern extension was split like the tail of a fish, the great bay formed thereby being filled with islands, which also extended about half of the distance across. The western extremity shelved very gradually, the sand-bars running out for miles just below the surface of the water.

     After this the travellers flew northward at great speed in the upper regions of the air, for they were anxious to hasten their journey. They found nothing but unbroken sea, and not till they reached latitude eighty-seven was there a sign of ice. They then saw

     Finally they reached another archipelago a few hundred miles in extent, the larger islands of which were covered with a sheet of ice, at the edges of which small icebergs were being formed by breaking off and slowly floating. Finding a small island on which the coating was thin, they grounded the Callisto, and stepped out for the first time in several days. The air was so still that a small piece of paper released at a height of six feet sank slowly and went as straight as the string of a plumb-line. The sun was bisected by the line of the horizon, and appeared to be moving about them in a circle, with only its upper half visible. As Jupiter's northern hemisphere was passing through its autumnal equinox, they concluded they had landed exactly at the pole.

     "Now to work on our experiment," said Cortlandt.

     "We can explode a small quantity of dynamite," replied Bearwarden, "after which the digging will be comparatively easy."

     While Cortlandt and Bearwarden prepared the mine, Ayrault brought out a pickaxe, two shovels, and the battery and wires with which to ignite the explosive. They made their preparations within one hundred feet of the Callisto, or much nearer than an equivalent amount of gunpowder could have been discharged.

     "This recalls an old laboratory experiment, or rather lecture," said Cortlandt, as they completed the arrangements, "for the illustration is not as a rule carried out. Explode two pounds of powder on an iron safe in a room with the windows closed, and the windows will be blown out, while the safe remains uninjured. Explode an equivalent amount of dynamite on top of the safe, and it will be destroyed, while the glass panes are not even cracked. This illustrates the difference in rapidity with which the explosions take place. To the intensely rapid action of dynamite the air affords as much resistance as a

     When they had moved beyond the danger line, Bearwarden, as the party's practising engineer, pressed the button, and the explosion did the rest. They found that the ground was frozen to a depth of but little more than a foot, below which it became perceptibly warm. Plying their shovels vigorously, they had soon dug the hole so deep that its edges were above their heads. When the floor was ten feet below the surrounding level the thermometer registered sixty.

     "This is scarcely a fair test," said Cortlandt, "since the heat rises and is lost as fast as given off. Let us therefore close the opening and see in what time it will melt a number of cubic feet of ice."

     Accordingly they climbed out, threw in about a cart-load of ice, and covered the opening with two of the Callisto's thick rugs. In half an hour all the ice had melted, and in another half hour the water was hot.

     "No arctic expedition need freeze to death here," said Bearwarden, since all a man would have to do would be to burrow a few feet to be as warm as toast."

     As the island on which they had landed was at one side of the archipelago, but was itself at the exact pole, it followed that the centre of the archipelago was not the part farthest north. This in a measure accounted for the slight thickness of ice and snow, for the isobaric lines would slope, and consequently what wind there was would flow towards the interior of the archipelago, whose surface was colder than the surrounding ocean. The moist air, however, coming almost entirely from the south, would lose most of its moisture by condensation in passing over the ice-laden land, and so, like the clouds over the region east of the Andes, would have but little left to let fall on this extreme northern part. The blanketing effect of a great thickness of snow would also cause, the lower strata of ice to melt, by keeping in the heat constantly given off by the warm planet.

     "I think there can be no question," said Cortlandt, "that, as a result of Jupiter's great flattening

     "The more I see of Jupiter," exclaimed Bearwarden enthusiastically, "the more charmed I become. It almost exactly supplies what I have been conjuring up as my idea of a perfect planet. Its compensations of high land near the equator, and low with effective internal heat at the poles, are ideal. The gradual slope of its continental elevations, on account of their extent, will ease the work of operating railways, and the atmosphere's density will be just the thing for our flying machines, while Nature has supplied all sources of power so lavishly that no undertaking will be too great. Though land as yet, to

     Since we have reached what we might call the end of Jupiter, and still have time, continued Ayrault, "let us proceed to Saturn, where we may find even stranger things than here. I hoped we could investigate the great red spot, but am convinced we have seen the beginning of one in Twentieth Century Archipelago, and what, under favourable conditions, will be recognized as such on earth."

     It was just six terrestrial weeks since they had set out, and therefore February 2d on earth.

     "It would be best, in any case, to start from Jupiter's equator," said Cortlandt, "for the straight line we should make from the surface here would be at right angles to Saturn. We shall probably, in spite of ourselves, swing a few degrees beyond the

     "All aboard for Saturn!" cried Bearwarden enthusiastically, in his jovial way. "This will be a journey."

     Having returned the rugs to the Callisto, they applied the maximum power of the batteries to rising, closed all openings when the barometer registered thirty, and moved off into space. When Several thousand miles above the pole, they diverted part of the power to attracting the nearest moon that was in the plane of Jupiter's equator, and by the time their upward motion had ceased were moving well in its direction. Their rapid motion aided the work of resisting gravity, since their car had in fact become a small moon, revolving, like those of Uranus or that of Neptune, in an orbit varying greatly from the plane of the ecliptic. As they flew south at a height ranging from two thousand to three thousand miles, the planet revolved before them, and they had a chance of obtaining a thorough view. There were but a few

     ""This," said Bearwarden, picking up a book,

     "`During the last few years a brilliant white spot has been visible on the equatorial border of the great southern belt. A curious fact in connection with this spot is, that it moves with a velocity of some two hundred and sixty miles per hour greater than the red spot. Denning obtained one hundred and sixty-nine observations of this bright marking during the years 1880-1883, and determined the period as nine hours, fifty minutes, eight and seven tenths seconds (five and a half minutes less than that of the red spot). Although the latter is now somewhat faint, the white spot gives promise of remaining visible for many years. During the year 1886 a large number of observations of Jupiter were made at the Dearborn Observatory, Chicago, U. S., by Prof. G. W. Hough, using the eighteen-and-a-half-inch refractor of the observatory. Inasmuch as these observations are not only of high intrinsic interest, but are in conflict, to some extent, with previous records, a somewhat full abstract of them will be useful: The object of general interest was the great red spot. The outline,

     "This shows," continued Bearwarden, "that as long ago as towards the close of the nineteenth century the old idea that we saw nothing but the clouds in Jupiter's atmosphere was beginning to change; and also how closely the two English writers and Prof. Hough were studying the subject, though their views did not entirely agree. A white spot is merely a storm-centre passing round and round the planet, the wind running a little ahead of the surface, which accounts for its rapid rotation compared with the red spot, which is a fixture. A critic may say we have no such winds on earth; to which I reply, that winds on a planet of Jupiter's size, with its rate of rotation -- though it is 480,000,000 miles from the sun and

     Later they saw several smaller spots drifting eastward, but concluded that any seaworthy ship might pass safely through them, for, though they were hurricanes of great violence, the waves were small.

     "There would be less danger," said Bearwarden, "of shipping seas here than there is on earth; the principal risk to travellers would be that of being blown from the deck. On account of the air's weight in connection with its velocity, this would necessitate some precaution."

     The next object of interest was the great red spot. It proved, as Cortlandt had predicted, to be a continent, with at that time no special colour, though they easily recognized it by comparing its outlines with those of the spot in the map. Its length, as they already knew, was twenty-seven thousand miles,

     "It is clear," said Cortlandt, "that at some season of Jupiter's long year a change takes place that affects the colour of the leaves -- some drought or prolonged norther; for it is obvious that that is the simplest explanation. In like manner we may expect that at some times more white spots will move across the ocean than at others."

     "On account of the size of these continents and oceans," said Bearwarden, "it is easy to believe that many climatic conditions may prevail here that can scarcely exist on earth. But what a magnificent world to develop, with its great rivers, lakes, and mountains showing at even this distance, and what natural resources must be lying there dormant, awaiting our call! This constantly recurs to my mind. The subjugation and thorough opening up of this red spot continent will probably supply more interesting problems than straightening the axis of the earth."

     "At our next visit," replied Ayrault, "when we have established regular interplanetary lines of

     Then they again attracted the nearest moon beyond which they had swung, increased the repulsion on Jupiter, and soared away towards Saturn.

     "We have a striking illustration of Jupiter's enormous mass," said Cortlandt, as the apparent diameter of the mighty planet rapidly decreased, "in the fact that notwithstanding its numerous moons, it still rotates so rapidly. We know that the earth's days were formerly but half or a quarter as long as now, having lasted but six or eight hours. The explanation of the elongation is simple: the earth rotates in about twenty-four hours, while the moon encircles it but once in nearly twenty-eight days, so that our satellite is continually drawing the oceans backward against its motion. These tidal brakes acting through the friction of the water on the bottom, its unequal pressure, and the impact of the waves on the shore, are continually retarding its rotation, so that the day is a fraction of a second longer now than it was in the time of Caesar. This same action is of course taking place in Jupiter and the great planets, in this case there being five moons at work. Our moon, we

     In crossing the orbits of the satellites, they passed near Ganymede, Jupiter's largest moon.

     "This," said Cortlandt, "was discovered by Galileo in 1610. It is three thousand four hundred and eighty miles in diameter, while our moon is but two thousand one hundred and sixty, revolves at a distance of six hundred and seventy-eight thousand three hundred miles from Jupiter, completes its revolution in seven days and four hours, and has a specific gravity of 1.87."

     In passing, they observed that Ganymede possessed an atmosphere, and continents and oceans of large area.

     "Here," said Bearwarden, "we have a body with a diameter about five hundred miles greater than the planet Mercury. Its size, light specific gravity, atmosphere, and oceans seem to indicate that it is less advanced than that planet, yet you think Jupiter has

     "Undoubtedly," said Cortlandt. "Jupiter was condensed while in the solar-system nebula, and began its individual existence and its evolutionary career long before Mercury was formed. The matter now in Ganymede, however, doubtless remained part of the Jupiter-system nebula till after Mercury's creation, and, being part of so great a mass, did not cool very rapidly. I should say that this satellite has about the same relation to Jupiter that Jupiter has to the sun, and is therefore younger in point of time as well as of development than the most distant Callisto, and older, at all events in years, than Europa and Io, both of which are nearer. This supposition is corroborated by the fact that Europa, the smallest of these four, is also the densest, having a specific gravity of 2.14, its smallness having enabled it to overtake Ganymede in development, notwithstanding the latter's start. In the face of the evidence before us we must believe this, or else that, perhaps, as in the case of the asteroid Hilda, something like a collision has rejuvenated it. This might account for its size, and for the Nautical Almanac's statement that there is a

     They had about as long a journey before them as they had already made in going from the earth to Jupiter. The great planet soon appeared as a huge crescent, since it was between them and the sun; its moons became as fifth-and sixth-magnitude stars, and in the evening of the next day Jupiter's disk became invisible to the unaided eye. Since there were no way stations, in the shape of planets or asteroids, between Jupiter and Saturn, they kept the maximum repulsion on Jupiter as long as possible, and moved at tremendous speed. Saturn was somewhat in advance of Jupiter in its orbit, so that their course from the earth had been along two sides of a triangle with an obtuse angle between. During the next four terrestrial days they sighted several small comets, but spent most of their time writing out their Jovian experiences. During the sixth day Saturn's rings, although not as much tilted as they would be later in the planet's season, presented a most superb sight, while they spun in the sun's rays. Soon after this the eight moons became visible, and, while slightly

     "I am anxious to ascertain," said Cortlandt, "whether the composition of yonder rings is similar to that of the comet through which we passed. I am sure they shine with more than reflected light."

     "We have been in the habit," said Ayrault, "of associating heat with light, but it is obvious there is something far more subtle about cometary light and that of Saturn's rings, both of which seem to have their birth in the intense cold of interplanetary space."

     Passing close to Mimas, Saturn's nearest moon, they supplemented its attraction, after swinging by, by their own strong pull, bringing their speed down to dead slow as they entered the outside ring. At distances often of half a mile they found meteoric masses, sometimes lumps the size of a house, often no larger than apples, while small particles like grains of sand moved between them. There were two motions. The ring revolved about Saturn, and the particles vibrated among themselves, evidently kept

     The Callisto soon became imbued with motion also, but nothing ever struck it. When any large mass came unusually near, both it and their car emitted light, and they rapidly separated. The sunlight was not as strong here as it had been when they entered the comet, and as they penetrated farther they were better able to observe the omnipresent luminosity. They were somewhat puzzled by the approach of certain light-centres, which seemed to contain nothing but this concentrated brightness. Occasionally one of these centres would glow very brightly near them, and simultaneously recede. At such times the Callisto also glowed, and itself recoiled slightly. At first the travellers could not account for this, but finally they concluded that the centres must be meteoric masses consisting entirely of gases, possessing weight though invisible.

     "We have again to face," said Cortlandt, "that singular law that till recently we did not suppose existed on earth. All kinds of suppositions have been advanced in explanation of these rings. Some writers have their thickness, looked at from the thin edge, as four hundred miles, some one hundred, and some but forty. One astronomer of the nineteenth century, a man of considerable eminence, was convinced that they consisted of sheets of liquid. Now, it should be obvious that no liquid could maintain itself here for a minute, for it would either fall upon the planet as a crushing hail, or, if dependent for its shape on its own tenacity, it would break if formed of the toughest steel, on account of the tremendous weight. Any number of theories have been advanced by any number of men, but in weight we have the rub. No one has ever shown how these innumerable fragments maintain themselves at a height of but a few thousand miles above Saturn, withstanding the giant's gravitation-pull. Their rate of revolution, though rapid, does not seem fast enough to sustain them. Neither have I ever seen it explained why the small fragments do not fall upon the large ones, though many astronomers have pictured the

     "I should go a step further," said Bearwarden, "and say our earth has the peculiarity, since it does not possess the influence necessary to generate naturally a great or even considerable development of apergy. The electricity of thunderstorms, northern lights, and other forces seems to be produced freely, but as regards apergy our planet's natural productiveness appears to be small."

     The omnipresent luminosity continued, but the glow was scarcely bright enough to be perceived from the earth.

     "I believe, however," said Bearwarden, referring to this, "that whenever a satellite passes near these fragments, preferably when it enters the planet's shadow, since that will remove its own light, it will create such activity among them as to make the luminosity visible to the large telescopes or gelatine plates on earth."

     "Now," said Ayrault, "that we have evolved enough theories to keep astronomers busy for some time, if they attempt to discuss them, I suggest that we alight and leave the abstract for the concrete."

     Whereupon they passed through the inner ring and rapidly sank to the ground.

     Landing on a place about ten degrees north of the equator, so that they might obtain a good view of the great rings -- since on the line only the thin edge would be visible -- they opened a port-hole with the same caution they had exercised on Jupiter. Again there was a rush of air, showing that the pressure without was greater than that within; but on this occasion the barometer stopped at thirty-eight, from which they calculated that the pressure was nineteen pounds to the square inch on their bodies, instead of fifteen as at sea-level on earth. This difference was so slight that they scarcely felt it. They also discarded the apergetic outfits that had been so useful on Jupiter, as unnecessary here. The air was an icy blast, and though they quickly closed the opening, the interior of the Callisto was considerably chilled.

     "We shall want our winter clothes," said Bearwarden; "it might be more comfortable for us exactly on the equator, though the scene at night will be far finer here, if we can stand the climate. Doubtless it will also be warmer soon, for the sun has but just risen."

     "I suspect this is merely one of the cold waves that rush towards the equator at this season, which corresponds to about the 10th of our September," replied Cortlandt. "The poles of Saturn must be intensely cold during its long winter of fourteen and three quarter years, for, the axis being inclined twenty-seven degrees from the perpendicular of its orbit, the pole turned from the sun is more shut off from its heat than ours, and in addition to this the mean distance -- more than eight hundred and eighty million miles -- is very great. Since the chemical composition of the air we have inhaled has not troubled our lungs, it is fair to suppose we shall have no difficulty in breathing."

     Having dressed themselves more warmly, and seen by a thermometer they had placed outside that the temperature was thirty-eight degrees Fahrenheit, which had seemed very cold compared with the

     Finding that the doctor's prediction as to the suitability of the air to their lungs was correct, they ventured out, closing the door as they went.

     Expecting, as on Jupiter, to find principally vertebrates of the reptile and bird order, they carried guns and cartridges loaded with buckshot and No. 1, trusting for solid-ball projectiles to their revolvers, which they shoved into their belts. They also took test-tubes for experiments on the Saturnian bacilli. Hanging a bucket under the pipe leading from the roof, to catch any rain that might fall -- for they remembered the scarcity of drinking-water on Jupiter -- they set out in a southwesterly direction.

     Walking along, they noticed on all sides tall lilies immaculately pure in their whiteness, and mushrooms and toadstools nearly a foot high, the former having a delicious flavour and extreme freshness, as though only an hour old. They had seen no animal life, or even sign of it, and were wondering at its dearth, when suddenly two large white birds

     "From the looks of these beauties," said Bearwarden, "I should say they probably inhabited a pretty cold place."

     "They are doubtless northern birds," said Cortlandt, "that have just come south. It is easy to believe that the depth to which the temperature may fall in the upper air of this planet must be something startling."

     As they turned from the cranes, to which species the birds seemed to belong, they became mute with astonishment. Every mushroom had disappeared, but the toadstools still remained.

     "Is it possible we did not see them?" gasped Ayrault.

     "We must inadvertently have walked some distance since we saw them," said Cortlandt.

     "They were what I looked forward to for lunch," exclaimed Bearwarden.

     They were greatly perplexed. The mushrooms were all about them when they shot the birds, which still lay where they had fallen.

     "We must be very absent-minded," said the doctor, "or perchance our brains are affected by the air. We must analyze it to see if it contains our own proportion of oxygen and nitrogen. There was a good deal of carbonic-acid gas on Jupiter, but that would hardly confuse our senses. The strange thing is, that we all seem to have been impressed the same way."

     Concluding that they must have been mistaken, they continued on their journey.

     All about they heard a curious humming, as that of bees, or like the murmuring of prayers in a resonant cathedral. Thinking it was the wind in the great trees that grew singly around them, they paid no attention to it until, emerging on an open plain and finding that the sound continued, they stopped.

     "Now," said Bearwarden, "this is more curious than anything we found on Jupiter. Here we have

     "It may possibly be some peculiarity of the grass," replied Cortlandt, "though, should it continue when we reach sandy or bare soil, I shall believe we need a dose of quinine."

     "I feel perfectly well," said Ayrault; "how is it with you?"

     Each finding that he was in a normal state, they proceeded, determined, if possible, to discover the source from which the sounds came. Suddenly Bearwarden raised his gun to bring down a long-beaked hawk; but the bird flew off, and he did not shoot. "Plague the luck!" said he; "I went blind just as I was about to pull. A haze seemed to cover both barrels, and completely screened the bird."

     "The Callisto will soon be hidden by those trees," said Cortlandt. "I think we had better take our bearings, for, if our crack shot is going to miss like that, we may want canned provisions."

     Accordingly, he got out his sextant, took the altitude of the sun, got cross-bearings and a few angles, and began to make a rough calculation. For several minutes he worked industriously, used the rubber at

     "I found the same thing," said Bearwarden, "but said nothing, for fear I should not be believed. In addition to going blind, for a moment I almost forgot what I was trying to do."

     Changing their course slightly, they went towards a range of hills, in the hope of finding rocky or sandy soil, in order to test the sounds, and ascertain if they would cease or vary.

     Having ascended a few hundred feet, they sat down near some trees to rest, the musical hum continuing meanwhile unchanged. The ground was strewn with large coloured crystals, apparently rubies, sapphires, and emeralds, about the size of hens' eggs, and also large sheets of isinglass. Picking up one of the latter, Ayrault examined it. Points of light and shade kept forming on its surface, from which rings radiated like the circles spreading in all directions from a place in still water at which a pebble is thrown. He called his companions, and the

     "This is more interesting," said Bearwarden, than sounding shells at the sea-shore. We must make a note of it as another thing to study."

     They then spread their handkerchiefs on a mound of earth, so as to make a table, and began examining the gems.

     "Does it not seem to you," asked Ayrault, a few minutes later, addressing his companions, "as though we were not alone? I have thought many times there was some one -- or perhaps several persons -- here besides ourselves."

     "The same idea has occurred to me," replied Cortlandt. "I was convinced, a moment ago, that a shadow crossed the page on which I was taking notes. Can it be there are objects about us we cannot see? We know there are vibrations of both light and sound that do not affect our senses. I wish we had brought the magnetic eye; perchance that might tell us."

     Anything sufficiently dense to cast a shadow,"

     They then returned to the study of the isinglass, which they were able to split into extremely thin sheets. Suddenly a cloud passed over the table, and almost immediately disappeared, and then a sharpened pencil with which Ayrault had been writing began to trace on a sheet of paper, in an even hand, and with a slight frictional sound.

     "Stop!" said Bearwarden; "let us each for himself describe in writing what he has seen."

     In a moment they had done this, and then compared notes. In each case the vision was the same. Then they looked at the writing made by the invisible hand. "Absorpta est mors in Victoria," it ran.

     Gentlemen, began Bearwarden, as if addressing a meeting, "this cannot be coincidence; we are undoubtedly and unquestionably in the presence of a spirit or of several spirits. That they understand Latin, we see; and, from what they say, they may

     "It is perfectly reasonable," said Ayrault, "to conclude it was a spirit, if we may assume that spirits have the power to move the pencil, which is a material object. Nobody doubts nowadays that after death we live again; that being the case, we must admit that we live somewhere. Space, as I take it, can be no obstacle to a spirit; therefore, why suppose they remain on earth?"

     "This is a wonderful place," said Cortlandt. "We have already seen enough to convince us of the existence of many unknown laws. I wish the spirit would reveal itself in some other way."

     As he finished speaking, the rays of the distant and cold-looking sun were split, and the colours of the spectrum danced upon the linen cloth, as if obtained by a prism. In astonishment, they rose and looked closely at the table, when suddenly a shadow that no one recognized as his own appeared upon the

     Greetings and congratulations," he said. "Man has steadfastly striven to rise, and we see the results in you."

     "I have always believed in the existence of spirits," said Cortlandt, "but never expected to see one with my natural eyes."

     "And you never will, in its spiritual state," replied the shade, "unless you supplement sight with reason. A spirit has merely existence, entity, and will, and is entirely invisible to your eyes."

     "How is it, then, that we see and hear you?" asked Cortlandt. "Are you a man, or a spectre that is able to affect our senses?"

     "I was a man," replied the spirit, "and I have given myself visible and tangible form to warn you of danger. My colleagues and I watched you when

     "What were the strange shadows and prismatic colours that kept passing across our table?" asked Bearwarden.

     "They were the obstructions and refractions of light caused by spirits trying to take shape," replied the shade.

     "Do you mind our asking you questions?" said Cortlandt.

     "No," replied their visitor. "If I can, I will answer them."

     "Then," said Cortlandt, "how is it that, of the several spirits that tried to become embodied, we see but one, namely, you?"

     "That," said the shade, "is because no natural law is broken. On earth one man can learn a handicraft better in a few days than another in a month, while some can solve with ease a mathematical problem that others could never grasp. So it is here. Perhaps I was in a favourable frame of mind on dying, for the so-called supernatural always interested me on earth, or I had a natural aptitude for these

     "Are we to understand, then," asked Cortlandt, "that the reason more of our departed do not reappear to us is because they cannot?"

     "Precisely," replied the shade. "But though the percentage of those that can return and reappear on earth is small, their number is fairly large. History has many cases. We know that the prophet Samuel raised the witch of Endor at the behest of Saul; that Moses and Elias became visible in the transfiguration; and that after his crucifixion and burial Christ returned to his disciples, and was seen and heard by many others."

     "How," asked Bearwarden deferentially, "do you occupy your time?"

     "Time, replied the spirit, "has not the same significance to us that it has to you. You know that while the earth rotates in twenty-four hours, this planet takes but about ten; and the sun turns on its own axis but once in a terrestrial month; while the years of the planets vary from less than three months for Mercury to Neptune's one hundred and sixty-four years. Being insensible to heat and cold,

     "Is there any limit," asked Bearwarden, "to human progress on the earth?"

     "Practically none," replied the spirit. "Progress depends largely on your command of the forces of Nature. At present your principal sources of power are food, fuel, electricity, the heat of the interior of the earth, wind, and tide. From the first two you cannot expect much more than now, but from the internal heat everywhere available, tradewinds, and falling water, as at Niagara, and from tides, you can obtain power almost without limit. Were this all, however, your progress would be slow; but the Eternal, realizing the shortness of your lives, has given you power with which to rend the globe. You have the action of all uncombined chemicals, atmospheric electricity, the excess or froth of which

     "With the powers at your disposal you can also alter and improve existing continents, and thereby still further increase the number of the children of men. Perhaps with mild climate, fertile soil, and decreased struggle for existence, man will develop his spiritual side.

     "Finally, you have apergy, one of the highest forces, for it puts you almost on a plane with angels, and with it you have already visited Jupiter and Saturn. It was impossible that man should remain chained to the earth during the entire life of his race,

     "How," asked Bearwarden, "can this be done?"

     "Force superheated steam," replied the spirit, "through an intensely heated substance, as you now do in making water-gas -- preferably platinum heated by electricity -- apply an apergetic shock, and the oxygen and hydrogen will separate like oil and water, the oxygen being so much the heavier. Lead them in different directions as fast as the water is decomposed -- since otherwise they would reunite -- and your supply of power will be inexhaustible."

     "Will you not stay and dine with us?" asked Ayrault. "While in the flesh you must be subject to its laws, and must need food to maintain your strength, like ourselves."

     "It will give me great pleasure," replied the spirit, "to tarry with you, and once more to taste earthly food, but most of all to have the blessed joy of being of service to you. Here, all being immaterial spirits, no physical injury can befall any of us; and since no one wants anything that any one else can give, we

     "Do you," asked Bearwarden, "not eat at all?

     "We absorb vitality in a sense," replied the spirit. "As the sun combines certain substances into food for mortals, it also produces molecular vibration and charges the air with magnetism and electricity, which we absorb without effort. In fact, there is a faint pleasure in the absorption of this strength, when, in magnetic disturbances, there is an unusual amount of immortal food. Should we try to resist it, there would eventually be a greater pressure without than within, and we should assimilate involuntarily. We are part of the intangible universe, and can feel no hunger that is not instantly appeased, neither can we ever more know thirst."

     "Why," asked Cortlandt reverently, " did the angel with the sword of flame drive Adam from the Tree of Life, since with his soul he had received that which could never die?"

     "That was part of the mercy of God," the shade replied; "for immortality could be enjoyed but meagrely on earth, where natural limitations are so abrupt. And know this, ye who are something of chemists, that had Adam eaten of that substance called fruit, he would have lived in the flesh to this day, and would have been of all men the most unhappy."

     "Will the Fountain of Youth ever be discovered?" asked Cortlandt.

     "That substances exist," replied the spirit, "that render it impossible for the germs of old age and decay to lodge in the body, I know; in fact, it would be a break in the continuity and balance of Nature did they not; but I believe their discovery will be coincident with Christ's second visible advent on earth. You are, however, only on the shore of the ocean of knowledge, and, by continuing to advance in geometric ratio, will soon be able to retain your mortal bodies till the average longevity exceeds Methuselah's; but, except for more opportunities of doing good, or setting a longer example to your fellows by your lives, where would be the gain?

     "I now see how what appeared to me while I

     "I wonder," thought Ayrault, "on which hand we shall be placed in that last day."

     "The classification is now going on," said the spirit, answering his thought, "and I know that in the final judgment each individual will range himself automatically on his proper side."

     "Do tell me," said Ayrault, "how you were able to answer my thought."

     "I see the vibrations of the grey matter of your brain as plainly as the movements of your lips"; in

     When their meal was ready they sat down, Ayrault placing the spirit on his right, with Cortlandt on his left, and having Bearwarden opposite. On this occasion their chief had given them a particularly good dinner, but the spirit took only a slice of meat and a glass of claret.

     "Won't you tell us the story of your life," said Ayrault to the spirit, "and your experiences since your death? They would be of tremendous interest to us."

     "I was a bishop in one of the Atlantic States," replied the spirit gravely, "and died shortly before the civil war. People came from other cities to hear my sermons, and the biographical writers have honoured my memory by saying that I was a great man. I was contemporaneous with Daniel Webster and Henry Clay. Shortly after I reached threescore and ten, according to earthly years, I caught what I considered only a slight cold, for I had always had good health, but it became pneumonia. My friends, children, and grandchildren came to see me, and all seemed going well, when, without warning, my physician

     "`O Death, where is thy sting? O Grave, where is thy victory?' In my dying moments I had forgotten what I had so often preached -- `Thou fool, that which thou sowest is not quickened except it die.' In a moment my life lay before me like a valley or an open page. All along its paths and waysides I saw the little seeds of word and deed that I had sown extending and bearing fruit forever for good or evil. I then saw things as they were, and realized the faultiness of my former conclusions, based as they had been on the incomplete knowledge obtained through embryonic senses. I also saw the Divine

     "Now that time is past, the books are closed, and we can do nothing further ourselves to alter our status for eternity, however much we may wish to. It is on this account, and not merely to save you from death, which in itself is nothing, that I now tell you to run to the Callisto, seal the doors hermetically, and come not forth till a sudden rush of air that you will see on the trees has passed. A gust in which even birds drop dead, if they are unable to escape, will be here when you reach safety. Do not delay to take this food, and eat none of it when you return, for it will be filled with poisonous germs."

     "How can we find you? " asked Ayrault, grasping his hand. "You must not leave us till we know how we can see you again."

     "Think hard and steadfastly of me, you three," replied the spirit, "if you want me, and I shall feel your thought"; saying which, he vanished before their eyes, and the three friends ran to the Callisto.

     On reaching it, they climbed the ladder leading to the second-story opening, and entering through this, they closed the door, screwing it tightly in place.

     "Now," said Cortlandt, "we can see what changes, if any, this wonderful gust will effect."

     "He made no strictures on our senses, such as they are," said Bearwarden, "but implied that evolution would be carried much further in us, from which I suppose we may infer that it has not yet gone far. I wish we had recorked those brandy peaches, for now they will be filled with poisonous germs. I wonder if our shady friend could not tell us of an antiseptic with which they might be treated?"

     "Those fellows," thought Ayrault, who had climbed to the dome, from which he had an extended

     "Let us note," said Cortlandt, "that the spirit thermometer outside has fallen several degrees since we entered, though, from the time taken, I should not say that the sudden change would be one of temperature."

     Just then they saw a number of birds, which had been resting in a clump of trees, take flight suddenly; but they fell to the ground before they had risen far, and were dashed to pieces. In another moment the trees began to bend and sway before the storm; and as they gazed, the colour of the leaves turned from green and purple to orange and red. The wind blew off many of these, and they were carried along by the gusts, or fluttered to the ground, which was soon strewed with them. It was a typical autumnal scene. Presently the wind shifted, and this was followed by a cold shower of rain.

     "I think the worst is over," said Bearwarden. "The Sailor's Guide says:

     Doubtless that will hold good here."

     This proved to be correct; and, after a repetition of the precautions they had taken on their arrival on the planet in regard to the inhalability of the air, they again sallied forth. They left their magazine shot-guns, taking instead the double-barrelled kind, on account of the rapidity with which this enabled them to fire the second barrel after the first, and threw away the water that had collected in the bucket, out of respect to the spirit's warning. They noticed a pungent odour, and decided to remain on high ground, since they had observed that the birds, in their effort to escape, had flown almost vertically into the air. On reaching the grove in which they had seen the storm, they found their table and everything on it exactly as they had left it. Bearwarden threw out the brandy peaches on the ground, exclaiming that it was a shame to lose such good preserves, and they proceeded on their walk. They passed hundreds of dead birds, and on reaching the edge of the toadstool valley were not a little surprised to find that every toadstool had disappeared.

     "I wonder," said the doctor, "if there can be any connection between the phenomenon of the disappearance of those toadstools and the death of the birds? We could easily discover it if they had eaten them, or if in any other way the plants could have entered their bodies; but I see no way in which that can have happened."

     Resolving to investigate carefully any other fungi they might see, they resumed their march. The cold, distant-looking sun, apparently about the size of an orange, was near the horizon. Saturn's rotation on its axis occupying only ten hours and fourteen minutes, being but a few minutes longer than Jupiter's, they knew it would soon be night. Finding a place on a range of hills sheltered by rocks and a clump of trees of the evergreen species, they arranged themselves as comfortably as possible, ate some of the sandwiches they had brought, lighted their pipes, and watched the dying day. Here were no fire-flies to light the darkening minutes, nor singing flowers to lull them to sleep with their song but six of the eight moons, each at a different phase, and with varied brightness, bathed the landscape in their pale, cold rays; while far above them, like a huge rainbow,

     "How poor a place compared with this," they thought to themselves, "is our world!" and Ayrault wished that his soul was already free; while the dead leaves rustling in the gentle breeze, and the nightwinds, sighing among the trees, seemed to echo his thought. Far above their heads, and in the vastness of space, the well-known stars and constellations, notwithstanding the enormous distance they had now come, looked absolutely unchanged, and seemed to them emblematic of tranquillity and eternal repose. The days were changed by their shortness, and by the apparent loss of power in the sun; and the nights, as if in compensation, were magnificently illuminated by the numerous moons and splendid rings, though neither rings nor satellites shone with as strong a light as the terrestrial moon. But in nothing outside of the solar system was there any change; and could AEneas's Palinurus, or one of Philip of Macedon's shepherds, be brought to life here, he would see exactly the same stars in the same positions; and, did he not know of his own death or of the lapse of

     "I have always regretted," said Cortlandt, "that I was not born a thousand years later."

     "Were it not," added Ayrault, "that our earth is the vestibule to space, and for the opportunities it opens, I should rather never have lived, for life in itself is unsatisfying."

     "You fellows are too indefinite and abstract for me," said Bearwarden. "I like something tangible and concrete. The utilitarianism of the twentieth century, by which I live, paradoxical though it may seem, would be out of place in space, unless we can colonize the other planets, and improve their arrangements and axes."

     Mixed with Ayrault's philosophical and metaphysical thoughts were the memories of his sweetheart at Vassar, and he longed, more than his companions, for the spirit's return, that he might ask him if perchance he could tell him aught of her, and whether her thoughts were then of him.

     Finally, worn out by the fatigue and excitement of the day, they set the protection-wires, more from

     "Seeing your white figures," said he, "rise apparently in response to those loud calls, reminded me of what the spirit told us of the last day, and of the awakening and resurrection of the dead."

     The scene was indeed weird. The east, already streaked with the rays of the rising far-away sun, and the pale moons nearing the horizon in the west, seemed connected by the huge bow of light. The snow on the dark evergreens produced a contrast of colour, while the other trees raised their almost bare and whitened branches against the sky, as though in suplication to the mysterious rings, which cast their light upon them and on the ground. As they gazed, however, the rings became grey, the moons disappeared, and another day began. Feeling sure the snow must have cleared the air of any deleterious substances it contained the day before, they descended into the neighbouring valley, which, having a southerly exposure, was warm in comparison with the hills. As they walked they disturbed a number of small rodents, which quickly ran away and disappeared in their holes.

     "Though we have seen none of the huge creatures here," said Cortlandt, "that were so plentiful on Jupiter, these burrowers belong to a distinctly higher scale than those we found there, from which I take it we may infer that the evolution of the animal kingdom has advanced further on this planet than on Jupiter, which is just what we have a right to expect; for Saturn, in addition to being the smaller and therefore more matured of the two, has doubtless had a longer individual existence, being the farther from the sun."

     Notwithstanding the cold of the night, the flowers, especially the lilies, were as beautiful as ever, which surprised them not a little, until, on examining them closely, they found that the sterns and veins in the leaves were fluted, and therefore elastic, so that, should the sap freeze, it could expand without bursting the cells, thereby enabling the flowers to withstand a short frost. They noticed that many of the curiously shaped birds they saw at a distance from time to time were able to move with great rapidity along the ground, and had about concluded that they must have four legs, being similar to winged squirrels, when a long, low quadruped, about

     "I hope we can get one of those, or at least his photograph," said Cortlandt.

     "If they go in pairs," said Bearwarden, "we may find the companion near."

     At that moment another great winged lizard, considerably larger than the first, rose with a snort, not twenty yards on their left. Cortlandt, who was a good shot with a gun at short range, immediately raised his twelve-bore and fired both barrels at the monster; but the double-B shots had no more disabling effect than if they had been number eights. They, however, excited the creature's ire; for, sweeping around quickly, it made straight for Cortlandt, breathing at him when near, and almost overpowering the three men with the malodorous, poisonous cloud it exhaled. Instantly Bearwarden fired several revolver bullets down its throat, while Ayrault pulled both barrels almost simultaneously, with the muzzles but a few inches from its side. In this case the initial velocity of the heavy buckshot was so great, and

     "It would take a stronger light than we get here," said Bearwarden, "to impress a negative through that haze. I think," he continued, "I know a trick that will do the business, if we see any more of these dragons." Saying which, he withdrew the cartridges from his gun, and with his hunting-knife cut the tough paper shell nearly through between the wads separating the powder from the shot, drawing his knife entirely around.

     "Now," said he, "when I fire those, the entire forward end of the cartridge will go out, keeping the fifteen buckshot together like a slug, and with such penetration that it will go through a two-inch plank. It is a trick I learned from hunters, and, unless your guns are choke-bore, in which case it might burst the barrel, I advise you to follow suit."

     Finding they had brought straight-bored guns, they arranged their cartridges similarly, and set out in the direction in which the winged lizards or dragons had gone.

     The valley narrowed as they advanced, the banks rising gently on both sides. Both dragons had flown straight to a grove of tall, spreading trees. On coming near to this, they noticed a faint smell like that of the dragon, and also like the trace they found in the air on leaving the Callisto the day before, after they had sought safety within it. Soon it almost knocked them down.

     "We must get to windward," said Cortlandt. "I already feel faint, and believe those dragons could kill a man by breathing on him."

     Accordingly, they skirted around the grove, and having made a quarter circle -- for they did not wish the dragons to wind them -- again drew nearer. Tree after tree was passed, and finally they saw an open space twelve or fifteen acres in area at the

     We may thank Providence," said Bearwarden,

     With a parting glance at the chasm that had saved their lives, and from which a cloud still arose, they turned slightly to the right of their former course and climbed the gently rising bank. When near the top, being tired of their exciting experiences, they sat down to rest. The ground all about them was covered with mushrooms, white on top and pink underneath.

     "This is a wonderful place for fungi," said Ayrault. "Here, doubtless, we shall be safe from the dragons, for they seemed to prefer the toadstools." As he lay on the ground he watched one particular mushroom that seemed to grow before his eyes. Suddenly, as he looked, it vanished. Dumfounded at this unmistakable manifestation of the phenomenon they thought they had seen on landing, he called his companions, and, choosing another mushroom, the three watched it closely. Presently, without the least noise or commotion, that also disappeared, leaving no trace, and the same fate befell a number of others. At a certain point of their development they vanished as completely as a bubble of air coming to the surface

     "Well," said Bearwarden, "in all my travels I never have seen anything like this. If I were at a sleight-of-hand performance, and the prestidigitateur, after doing that, asked for my theory, I should say, `I give it up.' How is it with you, doctor?" he asked, addressing Cortlandt.

     "There must be an explanation," replied Cortlandt, "only we do not know the natural law to which the phenomenon is subject, having had no experience with it on earth. We know that all substances can be converted into gases, and that all gases can be reduced to liquids, and even solids, by the application of pressure and cold. If there is any way by which the visible substance of these fungi can be converted into its invisible gases, as water into oxygen and hydrogen, what we have seen can be logically explained. Perhaps, favoured by some affinity of the atmosphere, its constituent parts are broken up and become gases at this barometric pressure and temperature. We must ask the spirit, if he visits us again."

     "I wish he would," said Ayrault; "there are lots of things I should like to ask him."

     "Presidents of corporations and other chairmen," said Bearwarden, "are not usually superstitious, and I, of course, take no stock in the supernatural; but somehow I have a well-formed idea that our friend the bishop, with the great power of his mind over matter, had a hand in that earthquake. He seems to have an exalted idea of our importance, and may be exerting himself to make things pleasant."

     At this point the sun sank below the horizon, and they found themselves confronted with night.

     "Dear, dear!" said Bearwarden, "and we haven't a crumb to eat. I'll stand the drinks and the pipes," he continued, passing around his ubiquitous flask and tobacco-pouch.

     "If I played such pranks with my interior on earth," said Cortlandt, helping himself to both, "as I do on this planet, it would give me no end of trouble, but here I seem to have the digestion of an ostrich."

     So they sat and smoked for an hour, till the stars twinkled and the rings shone in their glory.

     "Well," said Ayrault, finally, "since we have

     "The only motion I shall make," said Cortlandt, who was already undressed, "will be that of getting into bed," saying which, he rolled himself in his blanket and soon was fast asleep.

     Having decided that, on account of the proximity of the dragons, a man must in any event be on the watch, they did not set the protection-wires. From the shortness of the nights, they divided them into only two watches of from two hours to two and a half each, so that, even when constant watch duty was necessary, each man had one full night's sleep in three. On this occasion Ayrault and Cortlandt were the watchers, Cortlandt having the morning and Ayrault the evening watch. Many curious quadruped birds, about the size of large bears, and similar in shape, having bear-shaped heads, and several creatures that looked like the dragons, flew about them in the moonlight; but neither watcher fired a shot, as the creatures showed no desire to make an attack. All these species seemed to belong to the owl or bat tribe, for they roamed abroad at night.

     When Ayrault's watch was ended, he roused Cortlandt, who took his place, and feeling a desire for solitude and for a last long look at the earth, he crossed the top of the ridge on the slope of which they had camped, and lay down on the farther side. The South wind in the upper air rushed along in the mighty whirl, occasionally carrying filmy clouds across the faces of the moons; but about Ayrault all was still, and he felt a quiet and serene repose. He had every intention of remaining awake, and was pondering on the steadfastness of the human heart and the constancy of love, when his meditations began to wander, and, with his last thoughts on Sylvia, he fell asleep. Not a branch moved, nor did a leaf fall, yet before Ayrault's, sleeping eyes a strange scene was enacted. A figure in white came near and

     "I thought you had died," he said, as she gazed at him, "but you are now looking better than ever."

     "From the world's point of view I am dead," she replied. "I died and was buried. It is therefore permissible that I should show you the truth. You never believed I loved you. I have wished earnestly to see you, and to have you know that I did."

     "I did you an injustice," Ayrault answered, perceiving all that was in her heart. "Could mortals but see as spirits do, there would be no misunderstandings."

     "I am so glad to see you," she continued, "and to know you are well. Had you not come here, we could probably not have met until after your death; for I shall not be sufficiently advanced to return to earth for a long time, though my greatest solace while there was my religion, which is all that brought me here. We, however, know that as our

     Ayrault's sleep was then undisturbed for some time, when suddenly an angel, wreathed in light, appeared before him and spoke these words: "He that walked with Adam and talked with Moses has sent me to guard you while you sleep. No plague or fever, wild beast or earthquake, can molest you, for you are equally protected from the most powerful monster and the most insidious disease-germ. `Blessed is the man whose offences are covered and whose sins are forgiven.' Sleep on, therefore, and be refreshed, for the body must have rest."

     "A man may rest indeed," replied Ayrault, "when he has a guardian angel. I had the most unbounded faith in your existence before I saw you, and believe and know that you or others have often shielded me from danger and saved my life. Why am I worthy of so much care?"

     "`Whoso dwelleth under the defence of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty,'" answered the angel, and thereupon he

     "Not only am I in paradise," thought Ayrault; "I believe I am also in the seventh heaven. Would I might hear such words again!"

     A group of lilies then appeared before the sleeper's eyes. In the midst was one lily far larger than the rest, and of a dazzling white. This spoke in a gentle voice, but with the tones of a trombone:

     "Thy thoughts and acts are a pleasure to me. Thou hast raised no idols within thy heart, and thy faith is as incense before me. Thy name is now in the Book of Life. Continue as thou hast begun, and thou shalt live and reign forever."

     Hereupon the earth shook, and Ayrault was awakened. Great boulders were rolling and crashing down the slope about him, while the dawn was already in the east.

     "My mortal eyes and senses are keener here while I sleep than when I wake," he thought, as he looked about him, "for spirits, unable to affect me while waking, have made themselves felt in my more sensitive

     "The boulders were still in motion when I opened my eyes," he mused; "can it be that there is hereabouts such a flower as in my dreams I seemed to see?" and looking beyond where his head had lain, he beheld the identical lily surrounded by the group that his closed eyes had already seen. Thereupon he uncovered his head and departed quickly. Crossing the divide, he descended to camp, where he found Cortlandt in deep thought.

     "I cannot get over the dreams," said the doctor, "I had in the first part of the night. Notwithstanding yesterday's excitement and fatigue, my sleep was most disturbed, and I was visited by visions of my wife, who died long ago. She warned me against skepticism, and seemed much distressed at my present spiritual state."

     "I," said Bearwarden, who had been out early, and had succeeded in bringing in half a dozen birds, "was so disturbed I could not sleep. It seemed to me as though half the men I have ever known came and warned me against agnosticism and my materialis

     "I am convinced," said Ayrault, "that they were not altogether dreams, or, if dreams indeed, that they were superinduced by a higher will. We know that angels have often appeared to men in the past. May it not be that, as our appreciativeness increases, these communications will recur?" Thereupon he related his own experiences.

     "The thing that surprised me," said Cortlandt, as they finished breakfast, "was the extraordinary realism of the scene. We must see if our visions return on anything but an empty stomach."

     Resuming their march, the travellers proceeded along the circumference of a circle having a radius of about three miles, with the Callisto in the centre. In crossing soft places they observed foot-prints forming in the earth all around them. The impressions were of all sizes, and ceased when they reached rising or hard ground, only to reappear in the swamps, regulating their speed by that of the travellers. The three men were greatly surprised at this.

     "You may observe," said Cortlandt, "that the surface of the impression is depressed as you watch it, as though by a weight, and you can see, and even hear, the water being squeezed out, though whatever is doing it is entirely invisible. They must be made by spirits sufficiently advanced to

     Moved by a species of vandalism, Bearwarden raised his twelve-bore, and fired an ordinary cartridge that he had not prepared for the dragons, at the space directly over the nearest forming prints. There was a brilliant display of prismatic colours, as in a rainbow, and though the impressions already made remained, no new ones were formed.

     "Now you have done it!" said Cortlandt. "I hoped to be able to investigate this further."

     "We shall doubtless see other and perhaps more wonderful things," replied Bearwarden. "I must say this gives me an uncanny feeling."

     When they had completed a little over half their circle, they came upon another of the groves with which Saturn seemed to abound, at the edge of which, in a side-hill, was a cave, the entrance of which was composed of rocky masses that had apparently fallen together, the floor being but little higher than the surface outside. The arched roof of the vestibule was rendered watertight by the soil that had formed upon it, which again was overgrown by vines and bushes."

     "This," said Bearwarden, "will be a good place to camp, for the cave will protect us from dragons, unless they should take a notion to breathe at us from the outside, and it will keep us dry in case of rain. To-morrow we can start with this as a centre, and make another circuit."

     "We can explore Saturn on foot," said Cortlandt, and far more thoroughly than Jupiter, on account of its comparative freedom from monsters. Not even the dragons can trouble us, unless we meet them in large numbers."

     Thereupon they set about getting fuel for their fire. Besides collecting some of the dead wood that was lying all about, they split up a number of resinous pine and fir trees with explosive bullets from their revolvers, so that soon they not only had a roaring fire, but filled the back part of the cave with logs to dry, in case they should camp there again at some later day. Neither Cortlandt nor Bearwarden felt much like sleeping, and so, after finishing the birds the president had brought down that morning, they persuaded Ayrault to sit up and smoke with them. Wrapping themselves in their blankets -- for there was a chill in the air -- they sat about the camp-fire

     "In all the ages," said Cortlandt, "that these moons have wandered with Saturn about the sun, and with the solar system in its journey through space, they can never have gazed upon the scene they now behold, for we may be convinced that no mortal man has been here before."

     "We may say," said Ayrault, "that they see in our bodies a type of the source from which come all the spiritual beings that are here."

     "If, as the writers of mythology supposed," replied Cortlandt, "inanimate objects were endowed with senses, these moons would doubtless be unable to perceive the spiritual beings here; for the satellites, being material, should, to be consistent, have only those senses possessed by ourselves, so that to them this planet would ordinarily appear deserted."

     "I shall be glad," said Bearwarden, gloomily, when those moons wane and are succeeded by their fellows, for one would give me an attack of the

     As he spoke, the upper branches of the trees in the grove began to sway as a cold gust from the north sighed among them. "Lose no more opportunities," it seemed to cry, "for life is short and uncertain. Soon you will all be colder than I, and your future, still as easily moulded as clay, will be set as Marpesian marble, more fixed than the hardest rock."

      "Paradise," said Cortlandt, "contains sights and sounds that might, I should think, arouse sad reminiscences without the aid of the waters of Lethe, unless the joy of its souls in their new resources and the sense of forgiveness outweigh all else."

     With a parting look at the refined, silvery moon, and its sorrow-laden companion, they retired to the sheltering cave, piled up the fire, and talked on for an hour.

     "I do not see how it is," said Bearwarden, "that these moons, considering their distance from the sun, and the consequently small amount of light they receive, are so bright."

     A body's brightness in reflecting light," re

     When they came out shortly after midnight the girl's-face moon had already set, leaving a dark and dreary void in the part of the sky it had so ideally filled. The inexpressibly sad satellite (on account of its shorter distance and more rapid rate of revolution) was still above the horizon, and, being slightly tilted, had a more melancholy, heart-broken look than before. While they gazed sadly at the emptiness left by Dione, Cortlandt saw Ayrault's expression change, and, not clearly perceiving its cause, said, wishing to cheer him: "Never mind, Dick; to-morrow night we shall see it again."

     "Ah, prosaic reasoner," retorted Bearwarden, who saw that this, like so many other things, had re

     "History repeats itself," replied Cortlandt, "and the same phases of life recur. It is we that are in a changed receptive mood. The change that seems to be in them is in reality in us. Remain as you are now, and Dione will give you the same pleasure tomorrow that she gave to-day."

     To Ayrault this meant more than the mere setting

     He strung a number of copper wires at different degrees of tension between two trees, and listened to the wind as it ranged up and down on this improvised AEolian harp. It gradually ran into a regular refrain, which became more and more like words. Ayrault was puzzled, and then amazed. There could be no doubt about it. "You should be happy," it kept repeating -- "you should be happy," in soft musical tones.

     "I know I should," replied Ayrault, finally recognizing the voice of Violet Slade in the song of the wind, and I cannot understand why I am not. Tell me, is this paradise, Violet, or is it not rather purgatory?"

     The notes ranged up and down again, and he perceived that she was causing the wind to blow as she desired -- in other words, she was making it play upon his harp.

     "That depends on the individual," she replied.

     It is rather sheol, the place of departed spirits. Those whose consciences made them happy on earth are in paradise here; while those good enough to reach heaven at last, but in whom some dross remains, are further refined in spirit, and to them it is

     "It is the state in which desires are satisfied, my fair Violet," answered Ayrault.

     "Say, rather, the state in which desire coincides with duty," replied the song. "Self-sacrifice for others gives the truest joy; being with the object of one's love, the next. You never believed that I loved you. I dissembled well; but you will see for yourself some day, as clearly as I see your love for another now."

     "Yes," replied Ayrault, sadly, "I am in love. I have no reason to believe there is cause for my unrest, and, considering every thing, I should be happy as man can be; yet, mirabile dictu, I am in -- hades, in the very depths!"

     "Your beloved is beyond my vision; your heart is all I can see. Yet I am convinced she will not forget you. I am sure she loves you still."

     "I have always believed in homoeopathy to the extent of the similia similibus curantur, Violet, and it is certain that where nothing else will cure a man of love for one woman, his love for another will.

     "It is a sacrilege, my friend, to speak so to me now. You are done with me forever. I am but a disembodied spirit, and escaped hades by the grace of the Omnipotent, rather than by virtue of any good I did on earth. So far as any elasticity is left in my opportunities, I am dead as yon moon. You have still the gift that but one can give. Within your animal body you hold an immortal soul. It is pliable as wax; you can mould it by your will. As you shape that soul, so will your future be. It is the ark that can traverse the flood. Raise it, and it will raise you. It is all there is in yourself. Preserve that gift, and when you die you will, I hope, start on a plane many thousands of years in advance of me. There should be no more comparison between us than between a person with all his senses and one that is deaf and blind. Though you are a layman, you should, with your faith and frame of mind, soon be but little behind our spiritual bishop."

     "I supposed after death a man had rest. Is he, then, a bishop still?"

     "The progress, as he told you, is largely on the

     "You say he will do this in heaven. Is he, then, not there yet?"

     "He was not far from heaven on earth, yet technically none of us can be in heaven till after the general resurrection. Then, as we knew on earth, we shall receive bodies, though, as yet, concerning their exact nature we know but little more than then. We are all in sheol -- the just in purgatory and paradise, the unjust in hell."

     "Since you are still in purgatory, are you unhappy?"

     "No, our state is very happy. All physical pain is past, and can never be felt again. We know that our evil desires are overcome, and that their imprints are being gradually erased. I occasionally shed an intangible tear, yet for most of those who strove to obey their consciences, purgatory, when essential, though occasionally giving us a bitter twinge, is a joy-producing state. Not all the glories imaginable or unimaginable could make us happy, were our consciences ill at ease. I have advanced slowly, yet

     "Your voice is a symphony, sweetest Violet, and I love to hear your words. Ah, would you could once more return to earth, or that I were an ethereal spirit, that we might commune face to face! I would

     "You are talking for effect, Dick -- which is useless here, for I see how utterly you are in love."

     "I am in love, Violet; and though, as I said, I have no reason to doubt Sylvia's steadfastness and constancy, I am very unhappy. I have always heard that time is a balsam that cures all ills, yet I become more wretched every day."

     "Do all you can to preserve that love, and it will bring you joy all your life. Your happiness is my happiness. What distresses you, distresses me."

     The tones here grew fainter and seemed about to cease.

     "Before you leave me," cried Ayrault, "tell me how and when I may see or hear you again."

     "While you remain on this planet, I shall be near; but beyond Saturn I cannot go."

     "Yet tell me, Violet, how I may see you? My love unattained, you perceive, makes me wretched, while you always gave me calm and peace. If I may

     "If you break the ice in the pool behind you, you shall see me till the frame melts."

     After this the silence was broken only by the sighing of the wind in the trees. The pool had suddenly become covered with ice several inches thick. Taking an axe, Ayrault hewed out a parallelogram about three feet by four and set it on end against the bank. The cold grey of morning was already colouring the east, and in the growing light Ayrault beheld a vision of Violet within the ice. The face was at about three fourths, and had a contemplative air. The hair was arranged as he had formerly seen it, and the thoughtful look was strongest in the beautiful grey eyes, which were more serious than of yore. Ayrault stood riveted to the spot and gazed. "I could have been happy with her," he mused, and to think she is no more!"

     As drops fell from the ice, tears rose to his eyes.
. . . . . . .

     "What a pretty girl!" said Bearwarden to Cortlandt, as they came upon it later in the day. "The

     The next morning they again set out, and so tramped, hunted, and investigated with varying success for ten Saturnian days. They found that in the animal and plant forms of life Nature had often, by some seeming accident, struck out in a course very different from any on the earth. Many of the animals were bipeds and tripeds, the latter arranged in tandem, the last leg being evidently an enormously developed tail, by which the creature propelled itself as with a spring. The quadrupeds had also sometimes wings, and their bones were hollow, like those of birds. Whether this great motive and lifting power was the result of the planet's size and the power of gravitation, or whether some creatures had in addition the power of developing a degree of apergetic repulsion to offset it, as they suspected in the case of the boa-constrictor that fell upon Cortlandt on Jupiter, they could not absolutely ascertain. Life was far less prolific on Saturn than on Jupiter, doubtless as a result of its greater distance from the sun, and of its extremes of climate, almost all organic life being driven to the latitudes near the equator.

     "I shall be sorry," said Ayrault, as they sat near their fire, "to leave this place without again seeing the bishop. He said we could impress him anywhere, but it may be more difficult to do that at the antipodes than here."

     "It does seem," said Bearwarden, "as though we should be missing it in not seeing him again, if that

     "I think," said Ayrault, "as none of the spirits here are malevolent, they would warn us of danger if they could. The bishop's spirit seems to have been the only one with sufficiently developed power to reappear as a man. I therefore suggest that to-morrow we try to make him feel our thought and bring him to us."

     Accordingly, the next morning they concentrated their minds simultaneously on the spirit, wishing with all their strength that he should reappear.

     "Whether he be far or near," said Ayrault, "he must feel that, for we are using the entire force of our minds."

     Shadows began to form, and dancing prismatic colours appeared, but as yet there was no sign of the deceased bishop, when suddenly he took shape among them, his appearance and disappearance being much like that of stereopticon views on the sheet before a lantern. He held himself erect, and his thoughtful, dignified face had the same calm expression it had worn before.

     "We attracted your attention," said Ayrault, "in the way you said we might, because we longed so to see you."

     "Yes," added Bearwarden and Cortlandt, "we felt we must see you again."

     "I am always at your service," replied the spirit, and will answer your questions. With regard to my visibility and invisibility" -- he continued, with a smile, "for I will not wait for you to ask the explanation of what is in your minds -- it is very simple. A man's soul can never die; a manifestation of the soul is the spirit; this has entity, consciousness, and will, and these also live forever. As in the natural or material life, as I shall call it, will affects the material first. Thus, a child has power to move its hand or a material object, as a toy, before it can become the medium in a psychological seance. So it is here. Before becoming visible to your eyes, I, by my will, draw certain material substances in the form of gases from the ground, water, or air around me. These take any shape I wish -- not necessarily that of man, though it is more natural to appear as we did on earth -- and may absorb a portion of light, and so be able to cast a shadow or break up the white rays into prismatic colours, or they may be wholly invisible. By an effort of the will, then, I combine and condense these gases -- which consist principally of

     "These forms of organic life do not disintegrate till after death; here in the natural state they break

     "Having seen that, as on earth, we gain control of the material first, our acquisitiveness then extends to a better understanding and appreciation of our

     "But while you have still your earthly bodies and the opportunities they give you of serving God, you need not be concerned about hell; no one on earth, knowing how things really are, would ever again forsake His ways. The earthly state is the most precious opportunity of securing that for which a man would give his all. Even from the most worldly point of view, a man is an unspeakable fool not to improve his talents and do good. What would those in sheol not give now for but one day in the flesh on earth, of which you unappreciatives may still have so many? The well-used opportunities of even one hour might bring joy to those in paradise forever, and greatly ease the lot of those in hell. In doing acts of philanthropy, however, you must remember the text of the sermon the doctor of divinity preached

     "A new era is soon to dawn on earth. Notwithstanding your great material progress, the future will exceed all the past. Man will find every substance's maximum use, thereby vastly increasing his comfort. Then, when advanced in science and reason, with the power of his senses increased by the delicate instruments that you, as the forerunners of the coming man, are already learning to make, may he cease to be a groveller, like our progenitors the quadrupeds, and may his thoughts rise to his Creator, who has brought him to such heights through all the intricacies of the way. Your preparation for the life to come can also be greatly aided by intercourse with those who have already died. When you really want to associate spiritually with us, you can do so; for, though perhaps only one in a hundred million can, like me, so clothe himself as to be again visible to mortal eyes, many of us could affect gelatine or extremely sensitive plates that would show interruptions

     "We shall be charmed to dine with you," said Ayrault, "and shall be only too glad of anything that will keep you with us."

     "Then," said the spirit, "as the tablecloth is laid, we need only to have something on it. Let each please hold a corner," he continued, taking one himself with his left hand, while he passed his right to his brow. Soon flakes as of snow began to form in

     "As you doubtless have already suspected," said the spirit, "the basis of this in every case is carbon, combined with nitrogen in its solid form, and with the other gases the atmosphere here contains. You may notice that the flakes vary in colour as well as in taste, both of which are of course governed by the gas with which the carbon, also in its visible form, is combined. It is almost the same process as that performed by every plant in withdrawing carbon from the air and storing it in its trunk in the form of wood, which, as charcoal, is again almost pure carbon, only in this case the metamorphosis is far more rapid. This is perhaps the natural law that Elijah, by God's aid, invoked in the miracle of the widow's cruse, and that produced the manna that fed

     "What natural laws are known to you," asked Bearwarden, "that we do not understand, or

     "Most of the laws in the invisible world," said the spirit, are the counterpart or extension of laws that appear on earth, though you as yet understand but a small part of those, many not having come to your notice. You, for instance, know that light, heat, and motion are analogous, and either of the last two can be converted into the other; but in practice you produce motion of the water molecules by the application of heat, and seldom reverse it. One of the first things we master here is the power to freeze or boil water, by checking the motion of the molecules in one case, and by increasing it, and their mutual repulsion, in the other. This is by virtue of a simple law, though in this case there is no natural manifestation of it on earth with which to compare it. While knowledge must be acquired here through study, as on earth, the new senses we receive with the awakening from death render the doing so easy, though with only the senses we had before it would have been next to impossible.

     "At this moment snow is falling on the Callisto; but this you could not know by seeing, and scarcely

     "Your research on earth is the best and most thorough in the history of the race; and could we but give you suggestions as to the direction in which to push it, the difference between yourselves and angels might be but little more than that between the number and intensity of the senses and the composition of the body. By the combination of natural laws you have rid yourselves of the impediment of material weight, and can roam through space like spirits, or as Columbus, by virtue of the confidence that came with the discovery of the mariner's compass, roamed upon and explored the sea. You have made a good beginning, and were not your lives so short, and their requirements so peremptory, you might visit the distant stars.

     "I will show you the working of evolution. Life sleeps in minerals, dreams in plants, and wakes in you. The rock worn by frost and age crumbles to earth and soil. This enters the substance of the primordial plant, which, slowly rising; produces the

     "Can you tell us anything," asked Ayrault, "concerning the bodies that those surviving the final judgment will receive?"

     "Notwithstanding the unfolding of knowledge that has come to us here," replied the spirit, "there are still some subjects concerning which we must look for information to the inspired writers in the Bible, and every gain or discovery goes to prove their veracity. We know that there are celestial bodies and bodies terrestrial, and that the spiritual bodies we shall receive in the resurrection will have power and will be incorruptible and immortal. We also know by analogy and reason that they will be

     The water-jug being empty, Ayrault took it up, and, crossing the ridge of a small hill, descended to a running-brook. He had filled it, and was straightening himself, when the stone on which he stood turned, and he might have fallen, had not the bishop, of whose presence he had been unaware, stretched out his hand and upheld him.

     "I thought you might need a little help," he said with a smile, "and so walked beside you, though you knew it not. Water is heavy, and you may not yet have become accustomed to its Saturnian weight."

     "Many thanks, my master," replied Ayrault, retaining his hand. "Were it not that I am engaged to the girl I love, and am sometimes haunted by the thought that in my absence she may be forgetting

     "By remaining here," replied the spirit, with a sad look, "you would be losing the most priceless opportunities of doing good. Neither will I go with you; but, as your distress is real, I will tell you of anything happening on earth that you wish to know."

     "Tell me, then, what the person now in my thoughts is doing."

     "She is standing in a window facing west, watering some forget-me-nots with a small silver sprinkler which has a ruby in the handle."

     "Can you see anything else?"

     "Beneath the jewel is an inscription that runs:

     "Marvellous! Had I any doubts as to your prescience and power, they would be dispelled now. One thing more let me ask, however: Does she still love me?"

     "In her mind is but one thought, and in her heart is an image -- that of the man before me. She loves you with all her soul."

     "My most eager wish is satisfied, and for the moment my heart is at rest," replied Ayrault, as they turned their steps towards camp. "Yet, such is my weakness by nature, that, ere twenty-four hours have passed I shall long to have you tell me again."

     "I have been in love myself," replied the spirit, "and know the feeling; yet to be of the smallest service to you gives me far more happiness than it can give you. The mutual love in paradise exceeds even the lover's love on earth, for it is only those that loved and can love that are blessed.

     "You can hardly realize," the bishop continued, as they rejoined Bearwarden and Cortlandt, "the joy that a spirit in paradise experiences when, on reopening his eyes after passing death, which is but the portal, he finds himself endowed with sight that enables him to see such distances and with such distinctness. The solar system, with this ringed planet, its swarm of asteroids, and its intra-Mercurial planets -- one of which, Vulcan, you have already discovered -- is a beautiful sight. The planets nearest the sun receive

     "Though Cassandra's atmosphere, such as it is, is mostly clear, for the evaporation from the rivers and icy mediterraneans is slight, the brightness of even the highest noon is less than an earthly twilight, and the stars never cease to shine. The dark base of the rocky cliffs is washed by the frigid tide, but there is scarcely a sound, for the pebbles cannot be moved by the weightless waves, and an occasional murmur is all that is heard. Great rocks of ice reflect the light of the grey moons, and never

     "Though the solar system may seem complex, the sun is but a star among the millions in the Milky Way, and, compared with the planetary systems of Sirius, the stars of the Southern Cross, and the motions of the nebula, it is simplicity itself.

     "Over sixty million bright or incandescent stars were visible to the terrestrial telescopes a hundred years ago, the average size of which far exceeds our sun. To the magnificent telescopes of to-day they are literally countless, and the number can be indefinitely extended as your optical resources grow. Yet the number of stars you see is utterly insignificant compared with the cold and dark ones you cannot see, but concerning which you are constantly learning more, by observing their effect on the bright ones, both by perturbing them and by obscuring their rays. Occasionally, as you know, a star of the twelfth or fifteenth magnitude, or one that has been invisible, flares up for several months to the fourth or fifth,

     "A slight consideration of these figures will show that, notwithstanding the number of souls the Creator has given life on earth, each one might in fact have a system to himself; and that, however long the little globe may remain, as it were, a mint, in which souls are tried by fire and moulded, and receive their final stamp, they will always have room to circulate, and will be prized according to the impress their faces or hearts must show. But Sirius itself is moving many times faster than the swiftest cannon ball, carrying its system with it; and I see you asking, `To what does all this motion tend?' I will show you. Many quadrillions of miles away, so far that your most powerful telescopes have not yet caught a glimmer, rests in its serene grandeur a star that we call Cosmos, because it is the centre of this universe. Its diameter is as great as the diameter of Cassandra's orbit, and notwithstanding its terrific heat, its specific gravity, on account of the irresistible pressure at and near the centre,

     "We call this the universe because it is all that the clearest eyes or telescopes have been able to see, but it is only a subdivision -- in fact, but a system on a vaster scale than that of the sun or of Sirius. Far beyond this visible universe, my intuition tells me, are other systems more gigantic than this, and entirely different in many respects. Even the effects of gravitation are modified by the changed condition; for these systems are spread out flat, like the rings of this planet, and the ether of space is luminous instead of black, as here. These systems are but in a later stage of development than ours; and in the course of evolution our visible universe will be changed in the same way, as I can explain.

     "In incalculable ages, the forward motion of the planets and their satellites will be checked by the resistance of the ether of space and the meteorites and solid matter they encounter. Meteorites also overtake them, and, by striking them as it were in the rear, propel them, but more are encountered in front -- an illustration of which you can have by walking rapidly or riding on horseback on a rainy day, in

     "But these universes -- or, more accurately, divisions of the universe -- already planes, though the vast surfaces are not so flat as to preclude beautiful and gently rolling slopes, are spirit-lands, and will be inhabited only by spirits. Then there are great phosphorescent areas, and the colour of the surface changes with every hour of the day, from the most brilliant crimson to the softest shade of blue, radiant with many colours that your eyes cannot now see. There are also myriads of scented streams, consisting of hundreds of different and multi-coloured liquids, each with a perfume sweeter than the most delicate flower, and pouring forth the most heavenly music as they go on their way. But be not surprised at the magnitude

     But you men of finite understanding will ask, as I myself should have asked, How, by the law of hydrostatics, can liquids flow on a plane? Remember that, though these divisions are astronomical or geometrical planes, their surfaces undulate; but the moving cause is this: At the centre of these planes is a pole, the analogue, we will say, of the magnetic pole on earth, that has a more effective attraction for

     "Is there no way," asked Bearwarden, "by which a man may retrieve himself, if he has lost or misused his opportunities on earth?"

     "The way a man lays up treasures in heaven, when on earth," replied the spirit, "is by gladly doing something for some one else, usually in some form sacrificing self. In hell no one can do anything for any one else, because every one can have the semblance of anything he wishes by merely concentrating his mind upon it, though, when he has it, it is but a shadow and gives him no pleasure. Thus no one can give any one else anything he cannot obtain himself; and if he could, since it would be no sacrifice on his part, he would derive no great moral comfort from it. Neither can any one comfort any one

     "Inasmuch as both the good and the bad continue on the lines on which they started when on earth, we are continually drawing nearer to God, while they are departing. The gulf may be only one of feeling, but that is enough. It follows, then, that with God as our limit, which we of course can never reach, their limit, in the geometrical sense, must be total separation from Him. Though all spirits, we are told, live forever, it occurs to me that in God's mercy there may be a gradual end; for though to the happy souls in heaven a thousand years may seem as nothing, existence in hell must drag along with leaden limbs, and a single hour seem like a lifetime of regret. Since it is dreadful to think that such unsoothed anguish should continue forever, I have

     "But," persisted Bearwarden, "how about death-bed repentances?"

     "Those," replied the spirit, "are few and far between. The pains of death at the last hour leave but little room for aught but vain regret. A man dies

     "This, however, is a gloomy subject, and one that in your heart of hearts you understand. I would rather tell you more of the beauties and splendours of space -- of the orange, red, and blue stars, and of the tremendous cyclonic movements going on within them, which are even more violent than the storms that rage in the sun. The clouds, as the spectroscope has already shown, consist of iron, gold, and platinum in the form of vapour, while the openings revealed by sun-spots, or rather star-spots, are so tremendous that a comparatively small one would contain many dozen such globes as the earth. I could tell you also of the mysteries of the great dark companions of some of the stars, and of the stars that are themselves dark and cold, with naught but the far

     "Nature, in the process of evolution, has in all these cases gone off on an entirely different course, the most intelligent and highly developed species being in the form of marvellously complex reptiles, winged serpents that sing most beautifully, but whose blood is cold, being prevented from freezing in the upper regions of the atmosphere by the presence of salt and chemicals, and which are so intelligent that they have practically subdued many of these dark stars to themselves. On others, the most highly developed species have hollow, bell-shaped tentacles, into which they inject two or more opposing gases from opposite sides of their bodies, which, in combination, produce a strong explosion. This provides them with an easy and rapid locomotion, since the explosions find a sufficient resistance in the surrounding air to propel the monsters much faster than birds. These can at pleasure make their breath

      Still others have such delicate senses that in a way they commune with spirits, though they have no souls themselves; for in no part or corner of the universe except on earth are there animals that have souls. Yet they know the meaning of the word, and often bewail their hard lot in that no part of them can live when the heart has ceased to beat.

     "Ah, my friends, if we had no souls -- if, like the aesthetic reptilia, we knew that when our dust dissolved our existence would be over -- we should realize the preciousness of what we hold so lightly now. Man and the spirits and angels are the only beings with souls, and in no place except on earth are new souls being created. This gives you the greatest and grandest idea of the dignity of life and its

     "Is it not distasteful to you," Cortlandt asked, "to live so near these loathsome dragons?"

     "Not in the least," replied the spirit. "They affect us no more than the smallest micro-organism, for we see both with equal clearness. Since we are not obliged to breathe, they cannot injure us; and, besides, they serve to illustrate the working of God's laws, and there is beauty in everything for those that have the senses required for perceiving it. A feature of the spiritual world is, that it does not interfere with the natural, and the natural, except through faith, is not aware of its presence."

     "Then why," asked Cortlandt, "was it necessary for the Almighty to bring your souls to Saturn, since there would have been no overcrowding if you had remained on the earth?"

     "That," replied the spirit, "was part of His wisdom; for the spirit, being able at once to look back into the natural world, if in it, would be troubled at the mistakes and tribulations of his friends. Now, as a rule, before a spirit can return to earth, his or her relatives and friends have also died; or, if he can return before that happens, he is so advanced that he sees the ulterior purpose, and therefore the wisdom of God's ways, and is not distressed thereby. Lastly, as their expanding senses grew, it would be painful for the blessed and condemned spirits to be together. Therefore we are brought here, where God reveals Himself to us more and more, and the flight of the other souls -- those unhappy ones -- does not cease till they reach Cassandra."

     "Can the souls on Cassandra also leave it in time and roam at will?" asked Cortlandt.

     "I have seen none of them myself in my journeys to other planets; but as the sun shines upon the just and the unjust, and there is no exception to Nature's laws, I can reply that in time they do, and with equal powers their incentive to roam would be greater; for we are drawn together by common sympathy and pure, requited love, while they are mutually repelled.

     "Cannot you spirits help us, and the mortals now on earth, to escape this fate?"

     "The greatest hope for your bodies and souls lies in the communion with those that have passed through death; for the least of them can tell you more than the wisest man on earth; and could you all come or send representatives to the multitudes here who cannot as yet return to you, but few on earth would be so quixotically sinful as to refuse our advice. Since, however, the greatest good comes to men from the learning that they make an effort to secure, it is for you to strive to reach us, who can act as go-betweens from God to you."

     "It seems to me," said Bearwarden, "that people are better now than formerly. The sin of idolatry, for instance, has disappeared -- has it not?"

     "Men still set up idols of wealth, passion, or ambition in their hearts. These they worship as in days gone by, only the form has changed."

     "Could the souls on Cassandra do us bodily or mental injury, if we could ever reach their planet?" asked Bearwarden.

     "They might oppress and distress you, but your faith would protect you wherever you might go."

     "Can you give us a taste of your sense of prescience?" asked Bearwarden again; "for, since it is not clear in what degree the condemned receive this, and neither is it by any means sure that I shall be saved, I should like for once in my history to experience this sense of divinity, before my entity ends in stone."

     "I will transfer to you my sense of prescience," replied the spirit, "that you may foresee as prophets have. In so doing, I shall but anticipate, since you will yourselves in time obtain this sense in a greater or less degree. Is there any event in the future you would like to see, in order that, when the vision is fulfilled, it may tend to stablish your faith?"

     "Since I am the oldest," replied the doctor, "and shall probably die before my friends, reveal to us, I pray you, the manner of my death and the events immediately following. This may prove an object-lesson to them, and will greatly interest me."

     "Your death will be caused by blood-poisoning, brought on by an accident," began the spirit. "Some daybreak will find you weak, after a troubled night, with your bodily resources at a low ebb. Sunset will see you weaker, with your power of resistance almost gone. Midnight will find you weaker still, and but little removed from the point of death. A few hours later a kind hand will close the lids of your half-shut eyes, which never again will behold the light. The coffin will inclose your body, and the last earthly journey begin. Now," the spirit continued, "you shall all use my sight instead of your own."

     The walls of the cave seemed to expand, till they resembled those of a great cathedral, while the stalactites appeared to be metamorphosed into Gothic columns. They found themselves among a large congregation that had come to attend the last sad rites, while the great organ played Chopin's "Funeral March." The high vault and arches received the organ's tone, and a sombre light pervaded the interior. There was a slight flutter and a craning of necks among those in the pews, as the procession began to ascend the aisle. While the slow step of the pallbearers and those carrying the coffin sounded on

     "Oh, my faith!" cried Cortlandt, "I see my face within, yet it is but a decomposing mass that I once described as I."

     Then again did the minister's voice proclaim, "I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live; and whosoever liveth and believeth in me shall never die."

     The bearers gently set down their burden; the minister read the ever-impressive chapter of St. Paul to the Corinthians; a bishop solemnly and silently sprinkled earth on the coffin; and the choir sang the 398th hymn, beginning with the words, "Hark, hark my soul! angelic songs are swelling," which had always

     Then came a sweeping change of scene. A host of monuments and gravestones reflected the sunlight, while a broad river ebbed and flowed between high banks. A sexton and a watchman stood by a granite vault, the heavy door of which they had opened with a large key. Hard by were some gardeners and labourers, and also a crowd of curiosity-seekers who had come to witness the last sad rites. Presently a funeral procession appeared. The hearse stopped near the open vault, over the door of which stood out the name of CORTLANDT, and the accompanying minister said a short prayer, while all present uncovered their heads. After this the coffin was borne within and set at rest upon a slab, among many generations of Cortlandts. In the hearts of the relatives and friends was genuine sorrow, but the curiosity-seekers went their way and gave little thought. "To-morrow will be like to-day," they said, "and more great men will die."

     Then came another change of scene, though it

     "He was a great man," said one, "and if his soul blooms like the flowers on his grave, he must be in paradise, which we know is a finer park than this."

     "He was expert for the Government when the earth's axis was set right," said the second gardener, "and he must have been a scholar, for his calculations have all come true. He was one of the first three men to visit the other planets, while the obituaries in the papers say his history will be read hereafter like the books of Caesar. After burying all these great people, I sometimes wish I could do the same for myself, for the people I bury seem to be remembered." After this they relapsed into their meditations, the silence being broken only by an occasional murmur from the river's steady flow.

     Hereupon the voyagers found they were once

     "Thank Heaven," he cried, "we cannot ordinarily foresee our end; for but few would attain their predestined ending could they see it in advance. May the veil not again be raised, lest I faint before it! I looked in vain for my soul," he continued, but could see it nowhere."

     "The souls of those dying young," replied the spirit, "sometimes wish to hover near their ashes as if regretting an unfinished life, or the opportunities that have departed; but those dying after middle age are usually glad to be free from their bodies, and seldom think of them again."

     "I shall append the lines now in my head to my history," said Cortlandt, "that where it goes they may go also. They can scarcely fail to be instructive as the conclusions of a man who has seen beyond his grave." Whereupon be wrote a stanza in his note-book, and closed it without showing his companions what he had written.

     "May they do all the good you hope, and much more!" replied the spirit, "for the reward in the

     "O, my friends," the spirit continued most earnestly, addressing the three, "are you prepared for your death-beds? When your eyes glaze in their last sleep, and you lose that temporal world and what you perhaps considered all, as in a haze, your dim vision will then be displaced by the true creation that will be eternal. Your unattained ambitions, your hopes, and your ideals will be swallowed in the grave. Your works will secure you a place in history, and many will remember your names until, in time, oblivion covers your memory as the grass conceals your tombs. Are you prepared for the time when your eyes become blind, and your trusted senses fail? Your sorrowing friends will mourn, and the flags of your clubs will fly at half-mast, but no earthly thing can help you then. In what condition will the resurrection morning find you, when your sins of neglect and commission plead for vengeance, as Abel's blood from the ground? After that there can be no change. The classification, as I have already told you, is now going on; it will then be finished."

     "We are the most utterly wretched sinners!" cried Ayrault. "Show us how we can be saved."

     "As an inhabitant of spirit-land, I will give you worldly counsel," replied the bishop. "During my earthly administration, as I told you, people came from far to hear me preach. This was because I had eloquence and earnestness, both gifts of God. But I was a miserably weak sinner myself. That which I would, I did not, and that which I would not that I did; and I often prayed my congregation to follow my sermons rather than my ways. I seemed to do my followers good, and Daniel thus commends my way in his last chapter: `They that turn many to righteousness shall shine as the stars forever and ever,' and the explanation is clear. There is no surer way of learning than trying to teach. In teaching my several flocks I was also improved myself. I was sown in weakness, but was raised in power, strength being made perfect in weakness. Therefore improve your fellows, though yourself you cannot raise. The knowledge that you have sent many souls to heaven, though you are yourself a castaway, will give you unspeakable joy, and place you in heaven wherever you may be. Yet remember

     So saying, the spirit vanished in a cloud that for a time emitted light.

     "I am not surprised," said Bearwarden, "that people took long journeys to hear him. I would do so myself."

     "I have never had much fear of death," said Cortlandt, "but the mere thought of it now makes my knees shake, and fills my heart with dread. I thought I saw the most hateful forms about my coffin, and imagined that they might be the personification of doubt, coldness, and my other shortcomings, which had come perhaps from sympathy, in invisible form. I was almost afraid to ask the spirit for the explanation."

     "I saw them also," replied Bearwarden, "but took them to be swarms of microbes waiting to destroy your body, or perhaps trying in vain to penetrate your hermetically scaled coffin."

     Cortlandt seemed much upset, and spent the rest

     As the, night became darker they caught sight of the earth again, shining very faintly, and in his mind's eye Ayrault saw his sweetheart, and the old, old repining that, since reason and love began, has been in men's minds, came upon him and almost crushed him. Without saying anything to his companions, Ayrault left the cave, and, passing through the grove in which the spirit had paid them his second visit, went slowly to the top of the hill about half a mile off, that he might the more easily gaze at the faint star on which he could picture Sylvia.

     "Ah!" he said to himself, on reaching the summit, "I will stay here till the earth rises higher, and when it is far above me I will gaze at it as at heaven."

     Accordingly, he lay down with his head on a mound of sod, and watched the familiar planet.

     "We were born too soon," he soliloquized; "for had Sylvia and I but lived in the spiritual age foretold by the bishop, we might have held communion, while now our spirits, no matter how much in love, are separated absolutely by a mere matter of distance. It is a mockery to see Sylvia's dwelling-place, and feel that she is beyond my vision. O that, in the absence of something better, my poor imperfect eyes could be transformed into those of an eagle, but with a million times the power! for though I know that with these senses I shall see the resurrection, and hear the last trump, that is but prospective, while now is the time I long for sight."

     On the plain he had left he saw his friends' camp-fire, while on the other side of his elevation was a valley in which the insects chirped sharply, and through which ran a stream. Feeling a desire for solitude and to be as far removed as possible, he arose and descended towards the water. Though the autumn, where they found themselves, was well advanced, this night was warm, and the rings formed a great arch above his head. Near the stream the frogs croaked happily, as if unmindful of the long very long Saturnian winter; for though they were

     A pillar of stone standing near him was suddenly shattered, and the bishop stood where it had been.

     "Because," said the spirit, answering his thought, "it has not yet power to be free."

     "Can a man's soul not rise till his body is dead? asked Ayrault.

     The spirit hesitated.

     "Oh, tell me," pleaded Ayrault. "If I could see the girl to whom I am engaged, for but a moment, could be convinced that she loves me still, my mind would be at rest. Free my soul or spirit, or whatever it is, from this body, that I may traverse intervening space and be with her."

     "You will discover the way for yourself in time," said the spirit.

     "I know I shall at the last day, in the resurrection, when I am no longer in the flesh. Then I shall have no need of your aid; for we, know that in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like the angels of God in heaven. It is while I am mortal, and love as mortals do, that I wish to see my promised bride. A spirit may have other joys, and perhaps higher; but you who have lived in the world and loved, show me that which is now my heart's desire. You have shown us the tomb in which Cortlandt will

     "I pray that God will grant you this," said the spirit, "and make me His instrument, for I see the depth of your distress." Saying which, he vanished, leaving no trace in his departure except that the pillar of Stone returned to its place.

     With this rather vague hope, Ayrault set off to rejoin his companions, for he felt the need of human sympathy. Saturn's rapid rotation had brought the earth almost to the zenith, the little point shining with the unmistakably steady ray of a planet. Huge bats fluttered about him, and the great cloud-masses swept across the sky, being part of Saturn's ceaseless whirl. He found he was in a hypnotic or spiritualistic state, for it was not necessary for him to have his eyes open to know where he was. In passing one of the pools they had noticed, he observed that the upper and previously invisible liquid had the bright colour of gold, and about it rested a group of figures enveloped in light.

     "Why do you look so sad?" they asked. "You are in that abode of departed spirits known as paradise, and should be happy."

     "I suppose I should be happy, were I here as you are, as the reward of merit," he replied. "But I am still in the flesh, and as such am subject to its cares."

     "You are about to have an experience," said another speaker. "This day your doubts will be at rest, for before another sunset you will know more of the woman you love."

     The intensity of the spiritualistic influence here somewhat weakened, for he partially lost sight of the luminous figures, and could no longer hear what they said. His heart was in his month as he walked, and he felt like a man about to set out on his honeymoon, or like a bride who knows not whether to laugh or to cry. An indescribable exhilaration was constantly present.

     "I wonder," thought he, "if a caterpillar has these sensations before becoming a butterfly? Though I return to the rock from which I sprang, I believe I shall be with Sylvia to-day."

     Footprints formed in the soft ground all around him, and the air was filled with spots of phosphorescent light that coincided with the relative positions of the brains, hearts, and eyes of human beings. These surrounded and often preceded him, as though leading

     "I believe," he thought, with bounding heart, that I shall be initiated into the mysteries of space this night."

     At times he could hear even the words of the choruses ringing in his ears, though at others he thought the effect was altogether in his mind.

     "Oh, for a proof," he prayed, "that no sane man can doubt! My faith is implicit in the bishop and the vision, and I feel that in some way I shall return to earth ere the close of another day, for I know I am awake, and that this is no dream."

     A fire burned in the mouth of the cave, within which Bearwarden and Cortlandt lay sleeping. The specks of mica in the rocks reflected its light, but in addition to this a diffused phosphorescence filled the place, and the large sod-covered stones they used for pillows emitted purple and dark red flames.

     "Is that you, Dick?" asked Bearwarden, awaking and groping about. "We built up the fire so that you should find the camp, but it seems to have gone down." Saying which, he struck a match, whereupon Ayrault ceased to see the phosphorescence or

     "I think," said Ayrault, "I will go to the Callisto and get our mackintoshes before the rain sets in." Whereupon he left his companions, who were soon again fast asleep.

     The sky had suddenly become filled with clouds, and Ayrault hastened towards the Callisto, intending to remain there, if necessary, until the storm was over. For about twenty minutes he hurried on through the growing darkness, stopping once on high ground to make sure of his bearings, and he had covered more than half the distance when the rain came on in a flood, accompanied by brilliant lightning. Seeing the huge, hollow trunk of a fallen tree near, and not wishing to be wet through, Ayrault fired several solid shots from his revolver into the cavity, to drive out any wild animals there might be inside, and then hurriedly crawled in, feet first. He next drew in his head, and was congratulating himself on his snug retreat, when the sky became lurid with a flash of lightning, then his head dropped forward, and he was unconscious.

     As Ayrault's consciousness returned, he fancied he heard music. Though distant, it was distinct, and seemed to ring from the ether of space. Occasionally it sounded even more remote, but it was rhythmical and continuous, inspiring and stirring him as nothing that he had ever heard before. Finally, it was overcome by the more vivid impressions upon his other senses, and he found himself walking in the streets of his native city. It was spring, and the trees were white with buds. The long shadows of the late afternoon stretched across the way, but the clear sky gave indication of prolonged twilight, and the air was warm and balmy. Nature was filled with life, and seemed to be proclaiming that the cold was past.

     As he moved along the street he met a funeral procession.

     "What a pity," he thought, "a man should die, with summer so near at hand!"

     He was also surprised at the keenness of his sight; for, inclosed in each man's body, he saw the outline of his soul. But the dead man's body was empty, like a cage without a bird. He also read the thoughts in their minds.

     "Now," said a large man in the carriage next the hearse, I may win her, since she is a widow."

     The widow herself kept thinking: "Would it had been I! His life was essential to the children, while I should scarcely have been missed. I wish I had no duties here, and might follow him now."

     While pondering on these things, he reached Sylvia's house, and went into the little room in which he had so often seen her. The warm southwesterly breeze blew through the open windows, and far beyond Central Park the approaching sunset promised to be beautiful. The table was covered with flowers, and though he had often seen that variety, he had never before noticed the marvellous combinations of colours, while the room was filled

     "I have always loved this room," he thought, but it seems to me now like heaven."

     He sat down in an arm-chair from force of habit, to await his fiancee.

     "Oh, for a walk with Sylvia by twilight!" his thoughts ran on, "for she need not be at home again till after seven."

     Presently he heard the soft rustle of her dress, and rose to meet her. Though she looked in his direction, she did not seem to see him, and walked past him to the window. She was the picture of loveliness silhouetted against the sky. He went towards her, and gazed into her deep-sea eyes, which had a far-away expression. She turned, went gracefully to the mantelpiece, and took a photograph of herself from behind the clock. On its back Ayrault had scrawled a boyish verse composed by himself, which ran:

     As she read and reread those lines, with his whole soul he yearned to have her look at him. He watched the colour come and go in her clear, bright complexion, and was rejoiced to see in her the personification of activity and health. Beneath his own effusion on the photograph he saw something written in pencil, in the hand he knew so well:

     And as she glanced at it, these thoughts crossed her mind: "I shall never call you such names again. How much I shall have to tell you! It is provoking that you stay away so long."

     He came still nearer -- so near, in fact, that he could hear the beating of her heart -- but she still seemed entirely unconscious of his presence. Losing his reserve and self-control, he impulsively grasped at her hands, then fell on his knees, and then, dumfounded, struggled to his feet. Her hands seemed to slip through his; he was not able to touch her, and she was still unaware of his presence.

     Suddenly a whole flood of light and the truth

     "Oh," he thought, "could I but return to life for one hour, to tell her how incessantly she has been in my thoughts, and how I love her! Death, to the aged, is no loss -- in fact, a blessing -- but now!" and he sobbed mentally in the anguish of his soul. If he could but communicate with her, he thought; but he

     "Oh, horrible mockery!" he thought, thinking of the spirit. "He gave me worse than a stone when I asked for bread; for, in place of freedom, he sent me death. Could I but be alive again for a few moments!" But, with a bitter smile, he again remembered the words of the bishop, "What would a soul in hell not give for but one hour on earth?"

     Sylvia had seated herself on a small sofa, on which, and next to her, he had so often sat. Her gentle eyes had a thoughtful look, while her face was the personification of intelligence and beauty. She occasionally glanced at his photograph, which she held in her hand.

     "Sylvia, Sylvia!" he suddenly cried, rising to his knees at her feet. "I love, I adore you! It was my longing to be with you that brought me here. I

     "Is Dick here?" cried Sylvia, becoming deadly pale and getting up, "or am I losing my reason?"

     Seeing that she was distressed by the power of his mind, Ayrault once more sank to the floor, burying his face in his hands.

     Unable to endure this longer, and feeling as if his heart must break, he rushed out into the street, wishing he might soothe his anguish with a hypodermic injection of morphine, and that he had a body with which to divert and suppress his soul.

     Night had fallen, and the electric lamps cast their white rays on the ground, while the stars overhead shone in their eternal serenity and calm. Then was it once more brought home to him that he was a spirit, for darkness and light were alike, and he felt the beginning of that sense of prescience of which the bishop had spoken. Passing through the houses of some of the clubs to which he belonged, he saw his name still upon the list of members, and then he went to the places of amusement he knew so well. On all sides were familiar faces, but what interested him most was the great division incessantly going on.

     While his eyes beheld the sun, he had imagined the air felt warm and balmy. He now saw that this had been a hallucination, for he was chilled through and through. He also perceived that be cast no shadow, and that no one observed his presence. He, on the other hand, saw not only the air as it entered and left his friends' lungs, but also the substance of their brains, and the seeds of disease and death, whose presence they themselves did not even suspect, and the seventy-five per cent of water in their bodies, making them appear like sacks of liquid. In some he saw the germs of consumption; in others, affections of the heart. In all, he saw the incessant struggle between the healthy blood-cells and the malignant, omnipresent bacilli that the cells were trying to overcome. Many men and women he saw were in love, and he could tell what all were about to do. Oh, the secrets that were revealed, while the motives for acts were now laid bare that till then he had misunder

     "Tell me, O my progenitors," he cried, "you whose blood till this morning flowed in my veins, is there not some way by which I, as a spirit, can commune with the material world? I have always admired your judgment and wisdom, and you have all been in Shadowland longer than I. Give me, I pray you, some ancestral advice."

     The only sound in answer was the hum of the

     Near by were some open graves, ready to receive their occupants, while a little farther on he recognized the Cortlandt mausoleum, looking exactly as when shown him, through his second sight, by the spirit on the previous day.

     From the graves filled recently, and from many others, rose threads of coloured matter, in the form of gases, the forerunners of miasma. He now perceived shadowy figures flitting about on the ground and in the air, from whose eyes poured streams of

     "Tell me, fellow-spirits," he said, addressing them, "how can I communicate with one that is still alive?"

     They looked at him with moist eyes, but answered not a word.

     "I attributed the misery in my heart," thought Ayrault, "entirely to the distress at losing Sylvia, which God knows is enough; but though I suspected it before, I now see, by my companions, that I am in the depths of hell."

     Failing to find words to convey his thoughts, he threw himself into an open grave, praying that the earth might hide his soul, as he had supposed it some day would hide his body. But the ground was like crystal, and he saw the white bones in the graves all around him. Unable to endure these surroundings longer, he rushed back to his old haunts, where he knew he should find the friends of his youth. He did not pause to go by the usual way, but passed, without stopping, through walls and buildings. Soon he beheld the familiar scene, and heard his own name mentioned. But there was no comfort here, and what he had seen of old was but an incident to what he gazed on now. Praying with his whole heart that he might make himself heard, he stepped upon a foot-stool, and cried:

     "Your bodies are decaying before me. You are burying your talents in the ground. We must all stand for final sentence at the last day, mortals and spirits alike -- there is not a shadow of a shade of doubt. Your every thought will be known, and for every evil deed and every idle word God will bring us into judgment. The angel of death is among you and at work in your very midst. Are you prepared to receive him? He has already killed my body, and now that I can never die I wish there was a grave for my soul. I was reassured by a vision that told me I was safe, but either it was a hallucination, or I have been betrayed by some spirit. Last night I still lived, and my body obeyed my will. Since then I have experienced death, and with the resulting increased knowledge comes the loss of all hope, with keener pangs than I supposed could exist. Oh, that I had now their opportunities, that I might write a thesis that should live forever, and save millions of souls from the anguish of mine! Inoculate your mortal bodies with the germs of faith and mutual love, in a stronger degree than they dwelt in me, lest you lose the life above."

     But no one heard him, and he preached in vain.

     He again rushed forth, and, after a half-involuntary effort, found himself in the street before his loved one's home. Scarcely knowing why, except that it had become nature to wish to be near her, he stood for a long time opposite her dwelling.

     "O house!" he cried, "inanimate object that can yet enthral me so, I stand before your cold front as a suppliant from a very distant realm; yet in my sadness I am colder than your stones, more alone than in a desolate place. She that dwells within you holds my love. I long for her shadow or the sound of her step. I am more wretchedly in love than ever -- I, an impotent, invisible spirit. Must I bear this sorrow in addition to my others, in my fruitless search for rest? My life will be a waking nightmare, most bitter irony of fate."

     The trees swayed above his head, and the moon, in its last quarter, looked dreamily at him.

     "Ah," thought Ayrault, "could I but sleep and be happy! Drowsiness and weariness, fatigue's grasp is on me; or may Sylvia's nearness soothe, as her voice has brought me calm! Quiet I may some day enjoy, but slumber again, never! I see that souls in hades must ever have their misdeeds before them.

     A clock in a church-steeple now struck three, the sound ringing through the still night air.

     "It will soon be time for ghosts to go," thought Ayrault. "I must not haunt her dwelling."

     There was a light in Sylvia's study, and Ayrault remained meditatively gazing at it.

     "Happy lamp," he thought, "to shed your light on one so fair! She can see you, and you shine, for her. You are better off than I. Would that her soul might shine for me, as your light shines for her! The light of my life has departed. O that the darkness were complete! I am dead," his thoughts ran on, and when the privilege -- bitter word! -- that permits me to remain here has expired, I must doubtless return to Saturn, and there in purgatory work out my probation. But what comfort is it that

     "Even Sylvia's house will be a heap of ruins, or its place will be taken by something else. If I had Sylvia, I should care for nothing; as I have lost her, even this sight, though sweet, must always bring regret. I wish, at all events, I might see Sylvia, if only with these spirit-eyes, since, as a mortal, she may never gladden my sight again."

     To his surprise, he now perceived that he could see, notwithstanding the drawn shades. Sylvia was at her writing-desk, in a light-coloured wrapper. She sat there resting her head on her hand, looking thoughtful but worried. Though it was so late, she had not retired. The thrush that Ayrault had often in life admired, and that she had for some reason brought up-stairs, was silent and asleep.

     "Happy bird!" he said, "you obtain rest and forgetfulness on covering your head; but what wing

     "What is life?" he continued. "In the retrospect, nothing. It seems to me already as but an infinitesimal point. Things that engrossed me, and seemed of such moment, that overshadowed the duty of obeying my conscience -- what were they, and where? Ah, where? They endured but a moment. Reality and evanescence -- evanescence and reality."

     The light in Sylvia's room was out now, and in the east he beheld the dawn. The ubiquitous grey which he saw at night was invaded by streams of glorious crimson and blue that reached far up into the sky. He gazed at the spectacle, and then once more at that house in which his love was centred.

     "Would I might be her guardian angel, to guide her in the right and keep her from all harm! Sleep on, Sylvia. Sweet one, sleep. Yon stars fade beside your eyes. Your thoughts and your soul are fairer far than the east in this day's sunrise. I know what I have lost. Ah, desolating knowledge! for I have read Sylvia's heart, and know I was loved as truly as I loved. When Bearwarden and Cortlandt break her the news -- ah, God! will she live, and do they yet know I am dead?"

     Again came that spasm to shed spirit tears, and had he not known it impossible he would have thought his heart must break.

     The birds twittered, and the light grew, but Ayrault lay with his face upon the ground. Finally the spirit of unrest drove him on. He passed the barred door of his own house, through which he had entered so often. It was unchanged, but seemed deserted. Next, he went to the water-front, where he had left his yacht. Invisibly and sadly he stood upon her upper deck, and gazed at the levers, in response to his touch on which the craft had cleft the waves, reversed, or turned like a thing of life.

     "'Twas a pretty toy," he mused, "and many

     As he moped along he beheld two unkempt Italians having a piano-organ and a violin. The music was not fine, but it touched a chord in Ayrault's breast, for he had waltzed with Sylvia to that air, and it made his heart ache.

     "Oh, the acuteness of my distress," he cried, "the utter depth of my sorrow! Can I have no peace in death, no oblivion in the grave? I am reminded of my blighted, hopeless love in all kinds of unexpected ways, by unforeseen trifles. Oh, would I might, indeed, die! May obliteration be my deliverer!"

     "Poor fellows," he continued, glancing at the Italians, for he perceived that neither of the players was happy; the pianist was avaricious, while the violinist's natural and habitual jealousy destroyed his peace of mind.

     "Unhappiness seems the common lot," thought Ayrault. "Earth cannot give that joy for which we sigh. Poor fellows! though you rack my ears and distress my heart, I cannot help you now."

     It being the first day of the week, the morning air was filled with chimes from many steeples.

     "Divine service always comforted in life," thought Ayrault, "perchance it may do so now, when I have reached the state for which it tried to prepare me."

     Accordingly, he moved on with the throng, and soon was ascending the heights of Morningside Park, after which, he entered the cathedral. The priest whose voice had so often thrilled him stood at his post in his surplice, and the choir had finished the processional hymn. During the responses in the litany, and between the commandments, while the congregation and the choir sang, he heard their natural voices as of old ascending to the vaulted roof and arrested there. He now also heard their spiritual

     "The text, this morning," he began, "is from the eighth chapter of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans, at the eighteenth verse: `For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared to the glory that shall be revealed in us.' Let us suppose that you or I, brethren, should become a free and disembodied spirit. A minute vein in the brain bursts, or a clot forms in the heart. It may be a mere trifle, some unexpected thing, yet the career in the flesh is ended, the eternal life of the liberated spirit begun. The soul slips from earth's grasp, as air from our fingers, and finds itself in the frigid, boundless void of space. Yet, through some longing this soul might rejoin us, and, though invisible, might hear the church-bells ring, and long to recall some one of the many bright Sunday mornings spent here on earth. Has a direful misfortune be

     "In Revelation, xx, 6, we find these words, `Blessed and holy is he that hath part in the first resurrection: on such the second death hath no power.' I have often asked myself, May not this mean that those with a bad record in the general resurrection after a time cease to exist, since all suffer one death at the close of their period here?

     This is somewhat suggested by Proverbs, xii, 28,. `In the way of righteousness is life, and in the pathway thereof there is no death.' This might limit the everlasting damnation, so often repeated elsewhere,

     "Let us now turn to the bright picture -- the soul that has weathered the storms of life and has reached the haven of rest. The struggles, temptations, and trials overcome, have done their work of refining with a rapidity that could not have been equalled in any other way, and though, perhaps, very imperfect still, the journey is ever on. The reward is tenfold, yet in proportion to what this soul has done, for we know that the servant who best used his ten talents was made ruler over ten cities, while he that increased his five talents by five received five; and the Saviour in whom he trusted, by whose aid he made his fight, stands ready to receive him, saying, `Enter thou into the joy of thy Lord.'

     "As the dark, earthly background recedes, the clouds break and the glorious light appears, the contrast heightening the ever-unfolding and increasing delights, which are as great as the recipients have power to enjoy, since these righteous souls receive their rewards in proportion to the weight of the crosses that they have borne in the right spirit. These souls are a joy to their Creator, and are the heirs of

     "Where is now thy Saviour? where is now thy God? the unjust man has asked in his heart when he saw his just neighbour struggling and unsuccessful. Both the righteous and the unrighteous man are dead. The one has found his Saviour, the other is yearly losing God. What is the suffering of the present momentary time, eased as it is by God's mercy and presence, compared with the glories that await us? What would it be if our lives here were filled with nothing else, as ye know that your labour is not vain in the Lord? Time and eternity -- the finite and the infinite. Death was, indeed, a deliverer, and the sunset of the body is the sunrise of the soul."

     The priest held himself erect as a soldier while delivering this sermon, making the great cathedral ring with his earnest and solemn voice, while Ayrault, as a spirit, saw how absolutely he meant and believed every word that he said.

     Nearly all the members of the congregation were

     Ayrault had noticed Sylvia's father and mother in church, but Sylvia herself was not there, and he was distressed to think she might be ill.

     "Why," pondered Ayrault, "am I so unhappy? I was baptized, confirmed, and have taken the sacrament. I have always had an unshaken faith, and, though often unsuccessful, have striven to obey my conscience. The spirits also on Saturn kept saying I should be happy. Now, did this mean it was incumbent upon me to rejoice, because of some blessing I already had, and did not appreciate, or did their prescience show them some prospective happiness I was to enjoy? The visions also of Violet, the angel, and the lily, which I believed, and still believe, were no mere empty fancies, should have given me the most unspeakable joy. It may be a mistake to apply earthly logic to heavenly things, but the fundamental laws of science cannot change.

     "Why am I so unhappy?" he continued, returning

     At daybreak the thunder-shower passed off, but was followed by a cold, drenching rain. Supposing Ayrault had remained in the Callisto, Bearwarden and Cortlandt did not feel anxious, and, not wishing to be wet through, remained in the cave, keeping up a good fire with the wood they had collected. Towards evening a cold wind came up, and, thinking this might clear the air, they ventured out, but, finding the ground saturated, and that the rain was again beginning to fall, they returned to shelter, prepared a dinner of canned meat, and made themselves as comfortable as possible for the night.

     "I am surprised," said Cortlandt, "that Dick did not try to return to us, since he had the mackintoshes."

     "I dare say he did try," replied Bearwarden, "but

     "I hope," said Cortlandt, "no harm has come to him on the way. It will be a weight off my mind to see him safely with us."

     "Should he not turn up in the morning," replied Bearwarden, we must begin a search for him bright and early."

     Making up the fire as near the entrance of the cave as they could find a dry place, so that Ayrault should see it if he attempted to return during the night, they piled on wood, and talked of their recent experiences.

     "However unwilling I was," said Cortlandt, "to believe my senses, which I felt were misleading me, I can no longer doubt the reality of that spirit bishop, or the truth of what be says. When you look at the question dispassionately, it is what you might logically expect. In my desire to disprove what is to us supernatural, I tried to create mentally a system that would be a substitute for the one he described, but could evolve nothing that so perfectly filled the requirements,

     "It is the old story," said Bearwarden, "of Columbus and the egg. Schopenhouer and his predecessors appear to have tried every idea but the right one, and even Darwin and Huxley fell short in their reasoning, because they tried to obtain more or less than four by putting two with two."

     Thus they sat and talked while the night wore on. Neither thought of sleeping, hoping all the while that Ayrault might walk in as he had the night before.

     At last the dawn began to tint the east, and the growing light showed them that the storm had passed. The upper strata of Saturn's atmosphere being filled with infinitesimal particles of dust, as a result of its numerous volcanoes, the conditions were highly favourable to beautiful sunrises and sunsets. Soon coloured streaks extended far into the sky, and though they knew that when the sun's disc appeared it would seem small, it filled the almost

     Turning away from the welcome sight -- for their minds were ill at ease -- they found the light strong enough for their search to begin. Writing on a sheet of paper, in a large hand, "Have gone to the Callisto to look for you; shall afterwards return here, they pinned this in a conspicuous place and set out due west, keeping about a hundred yards apart. The ground was wet and slippery, but overhead all was clear, and the sun soon shone brightly. Looking to right and left, and occasionally shouting and discharging their revolvers, they went on for half an hour.

     "I have his tracks," called Bearwarden, and Cortlandt hastened to join him.

     In the soft ground, sure enough, they saw Ayrault's footprints, and, from the distance between them, concluded that he must have been running or walking very fast; but the rain had washed down the edges of the incision. The trail ascended a gentle slope, where they lost it; but on reaching the summit they saw it again with the feet together, as though Ayrault had paused, and about it were many

     "I hope," said Cortlandt, "these are nothing more than the footprints we have seen formed about ourselves."

     "See," said Bearwarden, "Dick's trail goes on, and the others vanish. They cannot have been made by savages or Indians, for they seem to have had weight only while standing."

     They then resumed their march, firing a revolver shot at intervals of a minute. Suddenly they came upon a tall, straight tree, uprooted by the wind and lying diagonally across their path. Following with their eyes the direction in which it lay, they saw a large, hollow trunk, with the bark stripped off, and charred as if struck by lightning. Obliged to pass near this by the uprooted tree-whose thick trunk, upheld by the branches at the head, lay raised about two feet from the ground -- both searchers gave a start, and stood still as if petrified. Inside the great trunk they saw a head, and, on looking more closely, descried Ayrault's body. Grasping it by the arms, they drew it out. The face was pale and the limbs

     "The spirit!" ejaculated Cortlandt. "Dick may be in a trance, in which case he can help us. Let us will hard and long. Accordingly, they threw themselves on their faces, closing their eyes, that nothing might distract their concentration. Minutes, which seemed like ages, passed, and there was no response.

     "Now," said Bearwarden, "will together, hard."

     Suddenly the stillness was broken by the spirit's voice, which said:

     "I felt more than one mind calling, but the effect was so slight I thought first I was mistaken. I will help you in what you want, for the young man is not dead, neither is he injured."

     Saying which, he stretched himself upon Ayrault, worked his lungs artificially, and willed with an intensity the observers could feel where they stood. Quickly the colour returned to Ayrault's cheeks, and with the spirit's assistance he sat up and leaned against the tree that had protected him from the storm.

     "Your promise was realized," he said, addressing

     "You see the mercy of God." said the spirit, "in not ordinarily allowing the spirits of the departed to revisit earth until they are prepared -- that is, until they are sufficiently advanced to go there unaided -- by which time they have come to understand the wisdom of God's laws. In your case the limiting laws were partially suspended, so that you were able to return at once, with many of the faculties and senses of spirits, but without their accumulated experience. It speaks well for your state of preparation that, without having had those disguised blessings, illness or misfortune, you were not utterly crushed by what you saw when temporarily released. While in the trance you were not in hell, but experienced the feelings that all mortals would if allowed to return immediately. Thus no lover can return to earth till

     "The spirits you saw in the cemetery were indeed in hell, but had become sufficiently developed to revisit the earth, though doing so did not relieve their distress; for neither the development of their senses, which intensifies their capacity for remorse and regret, nor their investigations into God's boundless mercies, which they have deliberately thrown away, can comfort them.

     "Some of your ancestors are on Cassandra, and others are in purgatory here. Though a few faintly felt your prayer, none were able to return and answer beside their graves. It was at your request and prayer that He freed your spirit, but you see how unhappy it made you."

     "I see," replied Ayrault, "that no man should wish to anticipate the workings of the Almighty, although I have been unspeakably blessed in that He made an exception -- if I may so call it -- in my favour, since, in addition to revealing the responsibilities of life, it has shown me the inestimable value

     "She already sleeps," replied the spirit, "and I have comforted her by a dream in which she sees that you are well."

     "When shall we start?" asked Bearwarden.

     "As soon as you can get ready," replied Ayrault. "I would not risk running short of enough current to generate the apergy needed to get us back. I dare say when I have been on earth a few years, and have done something for the good of my soul -- which, as I take it, can be accomplished as well by advancing science as in any other way -- I shall pine for another journey in space as I now do to return."

     "How I wish I were engaged," said Bearwarden, glancing at Cortlandt, and overjoyed at Ayrault's recovery.

     Accordingly, they resumed their march in the direction in which they had been going when they found Ayrault, and were soon beside the Callisto. Cortlandt worked the combination lock of the lower entrance, through which they crawled. Going to the second story, they opened a large window and

     Bearwarden and Ayrault immediately set about combining the chemicals that were to produce the force necessary to repel them from Saturn. Bubbles of hydrogen were given off from the lead and zinc plates, and the viscous primary batteries quickly had the wires passing through a vacuum at a white heat.

     "I see you are nearly ready to start," said the spirit, "so I must say farewell."

     "Will you not come with us?" asked Ayrault.

     "No," replied the spirit. "I do not wish to be away as long as it will take you to reach the earth. The Callisto's atmosphere could not absorb my body, so that, should I leave you before your arrival, you would be burdened with a corpse. I may visit you in the spirit, though the desire and effort for communion with spirits, to be of most good, must needs come from the earth. Ere long, my intuition tells me, we shall meet again.

     "The vision of your own grave," he continued, addressing Cortlandt, "may not come true for many years, but however long your lives may be, according to earthly reckoning, remember that when they are

     He held up his hands and blessed them; and then repeating, "Farewell and a happy return!" descended as he had come up.

     The air was filled with misty shadows, and the pulsating hearts, luminous brains, and centres of spiritual activity quivered with motion. They surrounded the incarnate spirit of the bishop and set up the soft, musical hum the travellers had heard so often since their arrival on Saturn.

     "I now understand," thought Ayrault, "why the spirits I met kept repeating that I should be happy. They perceived I was to be translated, and though they doubtless knew what suffering it would cause, they also knew I should be awakened to a sense of great realities, of which I understood but little."

     They drew up the ladder and turned on the current, and the Callisto slowly began to rise, while the three friends crowded the window.

     "Good-bye!" called the spirit's pleasant voice, to which the men replied in chorus.

     The sun had set on the surface of the planet while

     "There is something sad," said Cortlandt, "about the end of everything, but I am more sorry to leave Saturn than I have ever been in taking leave of any other place."

     When beyond the limits of the atmosphere they applied the full current, and were soon once more cleaving the ether at cometary speed, their motion towards the sun being aided by that great body itself.

     They quickly passed beyond the outer edge of the vast silvery rings, and then crossed one after another the orbits of the moons, from the last of which, Iapetus, they obtained their final course in the direction of the earth. They had an acute feeling of homesickness for the mysterious planet on which, while yet mortal, they had found paradise, and had communed with spirits as no modern men ever did.

     Without deviating from their almost straight line, they passed within a million miles of Jupiter, which had gained in its smaller orbit on Saturn, and a few days later crossed the track of Mars.

     As the earth had completed nearly half a revolution in its orbit since their departure, they here turned somewhat to the right by attracting the ruddy planet, in order to avoid passing too near the sun.

     "On some future expedition," said Ayrault, "and when we have a supply of blue glasses, we can take a trip to Venus, if we can find a possible season in her year. Compared with this journey, it would be only like going round the block."

     Two days later they had rounded the sun, and laid their course in pursuit of the earth.

     That the astronomers in the dark hemisphere were at their posts and saw them, was evident; for a brilliant beam of light again flashed forth, this time from a point a little south of the arctic circle, and after shining one minute, telegraphed this message: "Rejoiced to see you again. Hope all are well."

     Since they were not sufficiently near the moon's shadow, they directed their light-beam into their own, which trailed off on one side, and answered: "All

     The men at the telescopes then, as before, read the message, and telephoned the light this next question: "When are you coming down, that we may notify the newspapers "

     "We wish one more sight of the earth from this height, by daylight. We are now swinging to get between it and the sun."

     "We have erected a monument in Van Cortlandt Park, and engraved upon it, `At this place James Bearwarden, Henry Chelmsford Cortlandt, and Richard Rokeby Ayrault left earth, December 21, A. D. 2000, to visit Jupiter.'"

     "Add to it, `They returned on the 10th of the following June.'"

     Soon the Callisto came nearly between the earth and the sun, when the astronomers could see it only through darkened glasses, and it appeared almost as a crescent. The sight the travellers then beheld was superb. It was about 11 A. M. in London, and Europe was spread before them like a map. All its peninsulas and islands, enclosed blue seas, and bays came out in clear relief. Gradually Russia, Germany,

     They were loath to end the lovely scene, and would fain have remained where they were while the earth revolved again; but, remembering that their friends must by this time be waiting, they shut off the repulsion from the earth.

     "We need not apply the apergy to the earth until quite near," said Ayrault, "since a great part of the top speed will be taken off by the resistance of the atmosphere, especially as we go in base first. We have only to keep a sufficiently strong repulsion on the dome to prevent our turning over, and to see that our speed is not great enough to heat the car."

     When about fifty miles from the surface they felt the expected check, and concluded they had reached the upper limits of the atmosphere. And this increased,

     When about a mile from the earth they had the Callisto well in hand, and allowed it to descend slowly. The ground was already black with people, who, having learned where the Callisto was to touch, had hastened to Van Cortlandt Park.

     "I am overjoyed to see you," said Sylvia, when she and Ayrault met. "I had the most dreadful presentiment that something had gone wrong with you. One afternoon and evening I was so perplexed, and during the night had a series of nightmares that I shall never forget. I really believed you were near me, but your nature seemed to have changed, for, instead of its making me happy, I was frightfully distressed. The next day I was very ill, and unable to get up; but during the morning I fell asleep and had another dream, which was intensely realistic and made me believe -- yes, convinced me -- that you were well. After that dream I soon recovered; but oh, the anguish of the first!"

     Ayrault did not tell her then that he had been near her, and of his unspeakable suffering, of which hers had been but the echo.

     Three weeks later a clergyman tied the knot that was to unite them forever.

     While Sylvia and Ayrault were standing up to receive the congratulations of their friends, Bearwarden, in shaking his hand, said:

     "Remember, we have been to neither Uranus, nor Neptune, nor Cassandra, which may be as interesting as anything we have seen. Should you want to take another trip, count me as your humble servant." And Cortlandt, following behind him, said the same thing.

     Shortly after this, Sylvia went up-stairs to change her dress, and when she came down she and Ayrault set out on their journey together through life, amid a chorus of cheers and a shower of rice.

     Cortlandt then returned to his department at Washington, and Bearwarden resumed his duties with the Terrestrial Axis Straightening Company, in the presidential chair.
FINIS.