to the doctor's murmured regret. And now the words of the singer seemed to
take on a joyous meaning, and we could almost distinguish her invitation
to follow her to a place where the wind did not blow and where our present
troubles would be over. She kept well in the lead but walked only as fast
as our strength would allow, looking back constantly to encourage us with
her smile and ravishing one heart at least with the melody of her song.

Presently we came to the edge of an immense crater, hundreds of feet deep
and as empty and cold as all the others we had seen on the moon. Instead
of going around this, our leader chose a narrow ravine and took us down
the steep side to the bottom of the crater. We supposed she did this just
to give us protection from the wind, and we were very much sheltered, but
she did not stop here. Entering one of the many fissures in the rocks, she
led us into a narrow passage whose floor descended so rapidly and whose
solid roof shut out the light so quickly that in ordinary circumstances we
would have hesitated about proceeding. But, although it was soon
absolutely dark, we kept on, guided by that marvelous voice, now our sole
inspiration.

"Come, come, fear no harm," it seemed to say, and we were content to
follow blindly, even the doctor no longer objecting.

[Illustration: "POURING FORTH HER VOICE IN THAT EXQUISITE SONG."]

How many hours we proceeded in this way, going down, down, all the time,
toward the center of the globe, I have no means of telling; but I
distinctly remember that we began, after a time, to find, to our great
joy, that the air was becoming denser and we could breathe quite freely.
This gave us needed strength and justified the faith with which our
mysterious deliverer had filled us.