unreal little ornaments of your European excursion. And so the
two sets of human beings go their ways--to each nothing is
important, save that which each is doing.

There are great planets and suns that roll past us across this
cosmic ocean of ether. Our pathetic little round earth looks to
them as that fishing-boat of the Azores looks to you. And WE
think of those great interstellar travellers as the fisherman in
his little boat thinks of the ocean liner--the great star to us
is merely an interesting feature of OUR sky. And we actually
wonder whether there is any thought on that big, distant sun; any
intelligence on the vast ship that ploughs the ocean of limitless
space. ----

The high ridge of volcanic peaks and the others near it are made
fertile and green by soil gradually developed through the
centuries by seeds brought across the ocean by winds and birds.

The tops of the mountains are black lava. Lakes of black water
fill some of the quiet craters. Only, here and there, the rising
sulphur smoke from rocky fissures tells of heat and power
smouldering.

The last great eruption of the volcanoes occurred a little more
than two hundred years ago--so the inhabitants laugh if you speak
of danger. They forget that two hundred years in the earth's
life is as two minutes in the life of a man--and that what a man
did two minutes since he may do again.

Fences are built across the fields of thin soil that cover the