“They are a people so extraordinarily good,” she said with a laugh, “so refined and sublimated, that they cast no shadow in the sun.”
Severnius gave her a look of mild protest.
“They are a race exactly like ourselves, outwardly,” he said, “who inhabit a mountainous and very picturesque country called Caskia, in the northern part of this continent.”
“O, that is where the Perfect Pair came from,” I rejoined, remembering what he had told me about Man’s origin on Mars.
Elodia smiled. “Has Severnius been entertaining you with our religious fables?” she asked. I glanced at him and saw that he had not heard; he was finishing his letter.
“You will be interested in these Caskians,” he said to me animatedly as he folded it up; “I was. I spent some months in Lunismar, their capital, once, studying. They have rare facilities for reading the heavens there,—I mean of their own contrivance,—beside their natural advantages; their high altitude and the clearness of the air.”
“And they name themselves after the planetoids and other heavenly bodies,” interjected Elodia, “because they live so near the stars. What is the name of the superlative creature you were so charmed with, Severnius?”
“I suppose you mean my friend Calypso’s wife, Clytia,” returned he.
“O, yes, I remember,—Clytia. Is she to favor us?”
“Yes, and her husband and several others.”