thenceforth teach me if I pleased. Here was a bond of sympathy that I had
not looked for, but I was glad enough to avail myself of it, and delighted
to find that Mona was also pleased with the plan. With her for a teacher
it did not take me long to finish. Her graceful movements made poetry of
the language, and the web she was weaving around my heart was strengthened
every hour.

As Mona gradually learned to express herself to our comprehension we began
to ask her questions about herself and her history. The doctor, being less
under the spell of her charms than I was, showed a greater curiosity, and
one of the first things he asked was:

"When do you expect the other members of your family home?"

Mona was at first puzzled, but saw his meaning as soon as the motions were
repeated, and answered with a few simple signs:

"I have no friends to come home. I am alone."

The expression we put into our faces told her of our sorrow and sympathy
better than any words, and the doctor continued:

"But these other houses! Surely they are not all empty?"

"Yes," she replied, "their inmates are all gone. I am the only inhabitant
left."

And then she told us from time to time that there were no other villages
anywhere in the moon and that she was absolutely the last of her race. Our
method of conversation was not free enough to allow her to tell us how she