"It is said that occasionally some deluded victim of Barsoomian
superstition will so far escape the clutches of the countless
enemies that beset his path from the moment that he emerges from
the subterranean passage through which the Iss flows for a thousand
miles before it enters the Valley Dor as to reach the very walls
of the Temple of Issus; but what fate awaits one there not even
the Holy Therns may guess, for who has passed within those gilded
walls never has returned to unfold the mysteries they have held
since the beginning of time.

"The Temple of Issus is to the therns what the Valley Dor is imagined
by the peoples of the outer world to be to them; it is the ultimate
haven of peace, refuge, and happiness to which they pass after
this life and wherein an eternity of eternities is spent amidst
the delights of the flesh which appeal most strongly to this race
of mental giants and moral pygmies."

"The Temple of Issus is, I take it, a heaven within a heaven," I
said. "Let us hope that there it will be meted to the therns as
they have meted it here unto others."

"Who knows?" the girl murmured.

"The therns, I judge from what you have said, are no less mortal
than we; and yet have I always heard them spoken of with the utmost
awe and reverence by the people of Barsoom, as one might speak of
the gods themselves."

"The therns are mortal," she replied. "They die from the same