had you not been discovered and had the chamber in which we
found you continued intact, you might not have remained in a
state of suspended animation till, at the end of indefinite ages,
the gradual refrigeration of the earth had destroyed the bodily
tissues and set the spirit free."

I had to admit that, if I were indeed the victim of a practical
joke, its authors had chosen an admirable agent for carrying out
their imposition. The impressive and even eloquent manner of
this man would have lent dignity to an argument that the moon
was made of cheese. The smile with which I had regarded him as
he advanced his trance hypothesis did not appear to confuse him
in the slightest degree.

"Perhaps," I said, "you will go on and favor me with some
particulars as to the circumstances under which you discovered
this chamber of which you speak, and its contents. I enjoy good
fiction."

"In this case," was the grave reply, "no fiction could be so
strange as the truth. You must know that these many years I
have been cherishing the idea of building a laboratory in the
large garden beside this house, for the purpose of chemical
experiments for which I have a taste. Last Thursday the excava-
tion for the cellar was at last begun. It was completed by that
night, and Friday the masons were to have come. Thursday
night we had a tremendous deluge of rain, and Friday morning I
found my cellar a frog-pond and the walls quite washed down.
My daughter, who had come out to view the disaster with me,
called my attention to a corner of masonry laid bare by the