All arise in consternation and press about us. Mae, wild-eyed, shakes me back and forth. Father buries his face in his hands. Roba and Charley only, clap their hands. The tide now turns in our favor; all is pleasant bustle. The tender social visiting of their usual tenor and normal habit is changed to agitation in concocting a mode of preparation to ensure our safety, resulting in an elaborate scheme of training, to which we are subjected, separately, next day.
Bandaged securely we are rolled about and tossed. Suspended to a long rope we are dangled in mid air, swung in a circle with increasing speed. Hands are waved before us, jumping and shouting indulged in to harden our nerves. Left alone, click, the floor beneath is loosening, revolving, opening, black darkness ensues, then lights glimmer around; bells, whistles and reverberations fill all the air with din, followed by melody so low as scarcely to be heard—the music of the spheres.
This has taken days, as it has been necessary to repeat each lesson, over and over. Quite unnecessary, I think, is so much pains of preparation.
But at last the day is appointed, as all things are ready.
The city is astir from center to circumference. We are on view in Central Hall. The masses pass by us in solemn file to take leave of us, as of their dead. I feel to smile, but like the dead am turned to stone.
We next are placed in a round crystal globe receptacle. Packed in, Savant’s unique instruments to his hand. Fluid food to our mouths through a tube. Condensed air to our nostrils. We are locked in by Savant.
Now carried out on a long platform pier toward the abyss and placed upon the top of a huge iceberg mass—as weight to sink us.
Dynamite hurls us out over fields and blocks of surging ice, lifting us into the rose enfolding pit. My sole experience is precipitation. Conscious of swift descent, unattended by jar, thrilled to the center of my being, I realize my position.
Readers, what is to ensue, is the special key to the phenomena of Astronomy. For the contents of the next few pages, I have written this story.
I am not the first who has thought the earth to be hollow, and entered at the Arctics. Also that a rolling fire, and open sea, are within. That I define this fire, and its safe control, thereby discovering the secret of our planet, and its object in the solar system, is the first time such definition has been given ever. Is of such high importance I deem it my solemn duty to publish it.