home, it was salt. The sun shed a beautiful light around me, and as I
glanced upward to see how bright and cheerful the sky was, my reverie was
suddenly broken off, for directly over my head, poised as quietly as if it
had always been there, was our old moon. It seemed but a few miles away
and I gazed at it with mixed feelings, with thankfulness that I had
escaped from its inhospitable surface with my life, and with scorn for its
present behavior. For there it was, apparently perfectly at home and ready
to bear the torch for Mars as faithfully as it always had for the earth,
its rightful mistress.

"Inconstancy," I cried, "thy name is Luna."

[Illustration: THORWALD DISCOVERS ONE OF THE EARTH-DWELLERS.]

When the novelty of this sensational discovery was gone, my mind returned
to the contemplation of myself, and my situation seemed to me so unique as
to remove some of the natural feeling of fear. When one is shipwrecked in
the ordinary way his anxiety is caused by the uncertainty that anyone will
come to his rescue; while in my case I did not even know there was anyone
to come. But when I looked up at the moon and remembered its erratic
climate and our wild, unearthly journey, I could not suppress a feeling of
satisfaction with my changed condition. If the doctor had only been with
me we would have been able to extract considerable comfort from our
surroundings. But, as it was, I was very lonesome, and whatever
consolation I got from my reasoning about the planet's habitability was
increased a thousand fold by seeing a speck upon the horizon, which I
hoped might prove to be a sail. I watched it with intense interest, and
was not disappointed. I will not try to describe my feelings as this ship
of Mars approached me, while I sat wondering what manner of men I should
see. The first thing that struck me was the enormous size of the craft,