“I hope, Mona, if the doctor and I are freed from this peril that you will escape with us. If I thought there was no hope of that, I am sure I should propose that we return at once to the middle of the moon and be buried together.”
She laughed aloud as she sang out in joyous notes:
“Your mournful voice, my ardent friend, makes me think you would not be very happy with the last alternative. But cheer up, we will all stand by each other to the last.” It was in her abounding good nature and in her faculty for inspiring us with her own hopeful disposition that we found Mona fulfilling her promise to take care of us.
But now our attention could not be diverted from the planet which was rapidly growing before our eyes. As we approached nearer and nearer every minute, flying at such a terrific rate and aimed, apparently, for a direct collision, it may be imagined that the doctor and I, in spite of Mona’s presence, began to be exceedingly anxious lest our journey and our lives should meet an abrupt and common end.
Unless such excursions as ours become more frequent in the future, it will probably always remain a mystery how this one came to a close. I can only relate our experience during the time that we retained our consciousness, and leave the imagination to picture the rest. As we entered the atmosphere of the planet, the rush of air increased till it seemed as if a hundred Niagaras were sounding in our ears. I remember having a dim feeling of satisfaction in the belief that such a violent contact with the atmosphere must impede the moon’s progress, and offer us some chance of landing in safety. Then I was bereft of all sense, and when I regained consciousness I was lying in the bottom of our car in perfect quiet and apparently unharmed.
I called aloud for the doctor, but no voice replied. Rising, I looked about me and found I was afloat on a ruddy sea, alone, as far as my senses could inform me, alone in a new world. Such a sensation of homesickness came over me, such a longing for human fellowship, that our former lonesome condition on the moon seemed like a paradise compared to my present wretchedness.
So this was Mars, which we had studied with our telescopes and about whose condition and history we had so often speculated. And now, as I leaned my elbows on the edge of the car and gazed off over the deep, I wondered, with more interest than I had ever before possessed, if the world I had discovered were inhabited. Perhaps because it was such a vital question with me, my naturally hopeful disposition began to find reasons for a cheerful view. There were certainly favorable evidences all about me. I was breathing an atmosphere evidently made for lungs like mine. The air was soft and pleasant, and though I was drenched with water by my fall I was not uncomfortable. I tasted the water and, oh! joyful reminder of home, it was salt. The sun shed a beautiful light around me, and as I glanced upward to see how bright and cheerful the sky was, my reverie was suddenly broken off, for directly over my head, poised as quietly as if it had always been there, was our old moon. It seemed but a few miles away and I gazed at it with mixed feelings, with thankfulness that I had escaped from its inhospitable surface with my life, and with scorn for its present behavior. For there it was, apparently perfectly at home and ready to bear the torch for Mars as faithfully as it always had for the earth, its rightful mistress.
“Inconstancy,” I cried, “thy name is Luna.”
{Illustration: THORWALD DISCOVERS ONE OF THE EARTH-DWELLERS.}
When the novelty of this sensational discovery was gone, my mind returned to the contemplation of myself, and my situation seemed to me so unique as to remove some of the natural feeling of fear. When one is shipwrecked in the ordinary way his anxiety is caused by the uncertainty that anyone will come to his rescue; while in my case I did not even know there was anyone to come. But when I looked up at the moon and remembered its erratic climate and our wild, unearthly journey, I could not suppress a feeling of satisfaction with my changed condition. If the doctor had only been with me we would have been able to extract considerable comfort from our surroundings. But, as it was, I was very lonesome, and whatever consolation I got from my reasoning about the planet’s habitability was increased a thousand fold by seeing a speck upon the horizon, which I hoped might prove to be a sail. I watched it with intense interest, and was not disappointed. I will not try to describe my feelings as this ship of Mars approached me, while I sat wondering what manner of men I should see. The first thing that struck me was the enormous size of the craft, and as it drew near I could see that it was manned by beings proportionately large. I now began to fear I should be run down, but soon I noticed one of the passengers or crew who seemed to be looking at me through a glass. In a little while the vessel slowed up, and a boat was put off in which a number of giants, including the man with the glass, rowed toward me. When they had nearly reached me I heard the latter say to the others: