being heard in the atmosphere. The body then had fallen on some part
of the globe where it had been difficult to trace it; in the sea,
perhaps. Had it sunk in the depths of the Atlantic, the Pacific, or
the Indian Ocean? What was to be said in this matter?

But then, between the 2nd and 9th of June, there came a new series of
facts which could not possibly be explained by the unaided existence
of a cosmic phenomenon.

In a week the Hamburgers at the top of St. Michael's Tower, the Turks
on the highest minaret of St. Sophia, the Rouennais at the end of the
metal spire of their cathedral, the Strasburgers at the summit of
their minister, the Americans on the head of the Liberty statue at
the entrance of the Hudson and on the Bunker Hill monument at Boston,
the Chinese at the spike of the temple, of the Four Hundred Genii at
Canton, the Hindus on the sixteenth terrace of the pyramid of the
temple at Tanjore, the San Pietrini at the cross of St. Peter's at
Rome, the English at the cross of St. Paul's in London, the Egyptians
at the appex of the Great Pyramid of Ghizeh, the Parisians at the
lighting conductor of the iron tower of the Exposition of 1889, a
thousand feet high, all of them beheld a flag floating from some one
of these inaccessible points.

And the flag was black, dotted with stars, and it bore a golden sun
in its center.