A heavy reed, growing in abundance, was easily pasted and pressed into sheets of paper. Among the grasses we found one rice-like seed which gave us a substance which, when crushed, made a not unwholesome floury food. We found some roots which were palatable when baked. We had varied and delicious fruits.
We made cloth from straw and from bark, and from a cotton-like growth we manufactured a fine, soft, gauze-like material, very beautiful.
Along the mountain’s side was a flattened rock platform, upon which we built great rough-walled manufactories, and the smoke looked very earthly as it rose from the pipes and chimneys.
Of laborers we had a limitless supply, each hand as interested in our experiments as were we ourselves.
Of demand for our wares we had almost too much, for the whole Star wished to possess each article of convenience, dress or luxury. In a singularly perfect copy of Earth the furnishings and decorations of the rooms of the palaces of piled-up, smoothed stone thickened in the vales.
We taught these men the use of pen and ink; taught them correspondence, postal service and the value of the clinking silver coins.
We brought the study of music into light and they constructed, after our models, harps, cymbals, trumpets, guitars and drums. Anthems and chorals for the Cathedral service were chanted in the halls. Light and graceful melodies of Earth were trilled from the hills.
Art was represented by colossal statuary in glass, stone and lava, in painting and in metal work.
Oils and crude colors for painting were collected, the first from slain animals, the second from earths, crushed berries and ground minerals.
It was a busy, bustling little star, whirling in a furnace heat toward the sun. The only comfortable hours upon it were in the night when Venus was ablaze before us.