Evening Star Newspaper, August 8, 1896, Page 16

IN THE BY H. G. PART I sutenant stood in front of the stec! nd gnawed a piece of pine splinter. What do you think of it, Steevens?” he asked “It's an i * said Steevens, in the tone of one who keeps an open mind. bel it will smash—flat,” said the nat “He seems te have calculated it all out y well,” said Steevens, still impartial. it think of its pressure,” said the lieu- tenant. “At the surface of the water it's fourteen ds to the inch; thirty feet down it's nle that; sixty, treble; ninety, i, forty times; fiv i—that’s a mile—it's forty times fourteen n hu pounds; tha ee—thirty hundred- weight—a ton and a half, Steevens, a ton | to the square inch. And the he’s going is five miles deep. | a half—" said Steeve “but it's ant made no answer, but re- linter. The object of their a huge globe of ste . exterior of perhaps twenty feet. shot for some Titanic | It was claberately nested affolding built into the f-amework o: U 1, and the gigantic pars th were pres to sling it over- board gave the stern of the ship an appear- aised the curiosity of every who had sighted it, from the on to the tropic of Capricorn. In two places, one above the other, the | steel gave place to a couple of circular win- dow rmously thick glass, and one of | teel frame of great solidity, I: looke Piece of in a moustrou firs me that morning. i It was elaborately Tadded with air cushions, with little studs n Lulging pillows, to work the m of the affair. Everything added. even the Myers the glass i had been screwed in. It was padded that a man might ed from a gun in it with per- And it had to be, for presently te crawl in through that glass > screwed up tightly and to rd and to sink down, down, the Heutenant 1 taken the strongest hold of his a bore at mess, e new arrival on to about it over | manhole be flung overbe for five miles, even a: It h said. a opinion,” Hs! ler a ihe lieutenant, ply bend in and ure of that rocks run like | sures—and you mark } lid break in,” said Steevens, | ould shoo you ever fel in like a Jet of | a jet of high-| Tt would hit as hard as a | simply smash him and would tear down his ; it would blow in | nation you have.”" aw things vividly. of the inevit- out a few little bub- settle down comfortably day of judgment, among the { the bottom lay—with poor El lover his own smashed cush- ive as though he liked it _very ike butter over aid. lcok at the Jigger?” sald a) hem, and Elstead stood be- k and span, in white, with tween his teeth, and his eyes bread.” he “Are you dead certain the clockwork will act?" smiling out of the shadow of his ample hat "3 that about bread and but- Grumb nt pay of naval officers? an a day now before I y to- for swinging off five fron, isn't it said Wey- zhty feet down, and in a dozen seconds, there's ugh the wind | up above, and the} to the clouds. No. | oved to the side of the -r two followed him. All ard on their elbows and © the vellow green water. said Elstead, finishing his i | a dead certain that clockwork “asked Weybridge presently. worked thirty-five times,” sald “It's bound to work.” dnt go down In that confounded said Weybridge, “for twenty thou- chap you are.” sald Elstead, y at a bubble below. and yet b ou mean to tid Ste I'm screwed into the said nd when I've ie light off and on three ©s to show I'm cheerful, I'm swung out y the crane, with all those sslung below me. The top weight has a roller carrying a hundred strong cord rotled up, and that's ail that joins the sinkers to the sphere ex- cept the 8. that will be cut when the affair is dropped. We use cord rather than Wire rope because It’s easier to cut and more ary points, as you'll see. of these lead weights, you notice, there is a hole, and an fron rod will be run through that and will project six feet en the lower side. If that rod is rammed up from below it knocks up a lever and sets the clockwork in motion at the side of the cylinder on which the cord winds. Very well. The whole affair is lowered gently in- to the water and the slings are cut. The sphere floats—with the air in it it’s lighter than water—but the lead weights go down straight, and the cord runs out. When the cord is all paid out the sphere will go down, too, pulled down by the cord—” “But why the cord?’ asked Steevens. *#Why not fasten the weights directly to the sphere?” | _ “Because of the smash down below. The whole affair will go rushing down, mile [etter mile, at a headlong pace at last. It { ‘would be knoeked to pieces on the bottom t (Copyright, 1896, by the Bacheller Syndicate.) | chains hung ready to cut the tackle that | white light from down in the water that | fusion and a torrent of foam rushed across | others caught it up and shouted as though THE EVENING STAR, SATURDAY, AUGUST 8, 1896—TWENTY-FOUR PAGES ONO WOOD ABYSS. WELLS. SWOWOED. We coe if it wasn't for that cord. But the weights will hit the bottom, and directly they do the buoyancy of the sphere will come into play. It will go on sinking slow and slower: come to a stop at last and then begin to float upward again. That's where the clockwork comes in. Directly the weights smash against the bottom, the rod will be knocke through, and will kick up the clockwork, and the cord will be rewound on the reel. There I shall stay for half an hour, with the electric light on, looking about me. Then the clockwork will release a spring knife, the cord will be cut, and up I shall rush again, like a soda water bubble. The cord itself will help the flotation.”” ‘And if you should chance to hit a ship?” said Weybridge. “I should come up at such a pace, I should go clean through it,” sald Elstead. “Like ecard ball. You needn't worry about that.” “And suppose some nimble crusta: should wriggle into your clockwork—— “It wouid be a pressing sort of invitation for me to stop,” said Elstead, turaing his back on the water and staring at the sphere. They had swung Elstead overboard by 11 o'clock. The day was serenely bright and calm, with the horizon lost in h. The electric glare in the little upper compart- ment beamed cheerfully three times. Then they let him down slowly to the surface of the water, and a sailor in the stern held the lead weights and the sphere to- gether. The globe which had looked so large on deck looked the smallest thing conceivable under the stern of the ship. It rolled a little, and its two dark wind ws which floated uppermost se2med like eyes waste of phosphorescent waters under the little stars. : “If his window hasn’t burst and smashed him,” said Weybridge, “then it’s a cursed sight worse, for his clockwork has gone wrong and he's alive now, five miles under our feet, down there in the cold and dark, anchored in that little bubble of his, where never a ray of light has shown or a human being lived, since the waters were gathered together. He's there without food, feeling hungry and thirsty and scared, wondering whether he'll starve or stifie. Which will it be? The Myers apparatus is running out, I suppose. How long do they last?” “Geod heavens he exclaimed. “What little things we are! What daring little devils! Down there, miles and miles of water—all water, and all this empty water about us and this sky. Gulfs!” He threw Then It Came Into the Spray of Light. his hand out, and as he did so a little white streak swept nolgclessly up the sky, trav- eled slower, stopped, became a motionless dot, as though a new star had fallen up into the sky. Then it went sliding back again and lost itself amidst the retiections of the stars, and the white haze of the sea’s phosphorescence. At the sight he stopped, arm extended and mouth open. He shut his mouth, open- ed it again and waved his arms with an turned up in round wonderment at the | impatient gesture. ‘Then he turned, shout- Deople wha caradentheicen A tales went | ed “El-stead ahoy,” to the first wateh, and dered how Elstead liked the roliing. “Are | Went at a run to Lindley and the search you ready?” sang out the commander. | light. “I saw him,” he said. “Starboard ‘Aye, aye, sir.” “Then let her go." there! His light’s on and he's just shot The ropes of the tackle tightened against the blade and was cut, and an eddy rolled “Are you ready?” sang out the com- mander. over the globe in a grotesquely helpless fashion. Some one waved a handkerchief, one else tried an ineffectual cheer, a was counting slowly, “eight, nine, Another roll, then with a jerk and a splash the thing righted itself. It seemed to be stationary for a moment, to grow rapidly smaller, and then the water closed over it, and it became visible, en- larged by refraction and dimmer, below the surface. Before one could count three it had disappeared. There was a tlicker of som! diminished to a speck and vanished. Then there was nothing but a depth of water go- ing down in the blackness, through which a shark was swimming. Then suddenly the screw of the cruiser began to rotate, the water was crickled, the shark disappeared in a- wrinkled con- the crystalline clearness that had swallow- ed up Elstead. “What's the idee?” sald one able seaman to another. ‘ “We're going to lay off about a couple of miles, fear he should hit us when he comes up,” said his mate. PART II. The ship steamed slowly to her new post- tion. Aboard her almost everyone who was unoccupied remained watching the breathing swell into which the sphere had sunk. For the next half hour it is doubtful if a word was spoken that did not bear directly or indirectly on Elstead. The De- cember sun was now high in the sky and the heat very considerable. ‘He'll be cold enough down there,” said Weybridge. “They say that below a certain depth sea water’s almost just about freezing.” “Where'll he come "" asked Steevens. "ve lost my bearings. “That's the spot,” said the commander, who prided himself on his omniscience. He extended a precise finger southeastward. “And this, 1 reckon, fs pretty nearly the moment,” he said. “He's been thirty-five minutes. “How long does it take to reach the bot- tom of the ocean?” asked Steevens. “For a depth of five miles, and reckoning —as we did—an acceleration of two feet per econd, both ways, is just about three- quarters of a minute." “Then he's overdue,” said Weybridge. “Pretty nearly,” said the commander. “I suppose it takes a few minutes for that cord of his to wind in.” “I forgot that,” said Weybridge, evident- ly relieved. And then began the suspenge. A minute slowly dragged itself out, and no sphere shot out of the water. Another followed, and nothing broke the low, olly swell. The sailors explained to one another that little int about the winding in of the cord. ie rigging was dotted with expectant : “Come up, Elstead!” hairy-chested salt, impatiently, and the they were waiting for the curtain ofa theater to rise. The commander glanced irritably at them. “Of course if the accel- eration’s less than two,” he said, ‘he'll be all the longer. We aren't absolutely cer. tain that was the proper figure. I'm no slavish believer in calculations.” Steevens agreed concisely. No one on the quarter deck spoke for a couple of minutes. Then Steevens’ watch-case clicked. When, twenty-one minutes after, the sun reached the zenith, they were still wai ing for the globe to reappear, and not a man aboard had dared to whisper that hope was ‘lead. It was Weybridge who first guve expression to that realization. He The Ship’s Doctor Crawled In. spoke while the sound of eight bells still hung im the air. “I always distrusted that window,” he sald, quite suddenly to Stee- vens. “Good God!" said Stcevens, “you don’t think—?" “Well,” said Weybridge, and ieft the rest to his imagination. “I'm no great believer in calculations myself,” said the commander, dubiously. “So that I'm not altogether hi yet. And at midnight the gunboat was steam- ing slowly in a spiral round the spot where the globe had sunk, and the white beam of the electric light fled and halted and swept discontentedly onward again over the ‘ —$—$——————— Se area RL a ce a CRNA Se oN SRT BRP ce re Ce SE El N= SY piglet Mo tel het out of the water. Bring the ight round. We ought to see nim drifting when he lifts on the swell.” But they never picked up the explorer until dawn. Then they almost ran him down. The crane was swung out and a boat’s crew hooked the chain to the sphere. When they had shipped the sphere they unscrewed the manhole and peered into the darkness of the interior (for the electric light chamber was intended to Il- luminate the water about the sphere, and was shut off entirely from its general cav- ity). The air was very hot within the cavity, and the India rubber at the lip of the manhole was soft. There was no an- Swer to the eager questions and no sound of mcvement within. Elstead seemed to be lying motionless, crumpled up, in the bottom of the giobe. The ship's doctor crawled in ard lifted him out to the men outside. For a moment or so they did not know whether Elstead was alive or dead. His face in the yellow light of the ship's lamps glistened with perspiration. They carried him down to his own cabin. He was not dead, they found, but in a state of absolute nervous collapse, and be- sides cruelly bruised. For some days he had to He perfectly still. It was a week befere he could tell his experienc Almost his first words were that he was going down again. The sphere would have to be altered, he said, in order to allow him to throw off the cord if need be, and that was ell. He had had the most marvelous experience. “You thought I should find nothirg but ooze,” he said. “You laughed at my explorations. And I've discovered a new world!” He told his story in discon- nected fragments, and chiefly from the wrorg end, so that it is impossible to re- tell it In his words. But what follows {s the tarrative of his experience. It began atrociously, he said. Before the cord ran out the thing kept rolling over. He felt like a frog in a football. He could see nothing but the crane and the sky over- head, with an occasional glimpse of the people on the ship's rail. He couldn’t tella bit which way the thing would roll next. Suddenly he would find his feet going up, and try to step, an@ over he went rolling, head over heels and just anyhow on the padding. Any other shape would have been more comfortable, but no other shape was to be relied upon under the huge pressure of the nethermost abyss. Suddenly the swaying ceased; the globe righted, and when he had picked himself up he saw the water all about him greeny-blue with an attenuated light filtering down from above, and a shoal of little floating things went rushing up past him, as it seemed to him, toward the light. And even as he looked {t grew darker and darker until the water above was as dark as the midnight sky, albeit of a greener shade, and the water be- low black. And little transparent things in the water developed a faint ghost of lumi- nosity, and shot past him in faint greenish streaks. And the feeling of falling! It was just like the start of a lift, he said, only it kept on. One has to imagine what that means, that keeping on. It was then, of all times, that Elstead repented of his adven- ture. He saw the chances against him in an altogether new light. He thought of the big cuttlefish people knew to exist in the middle waters, the kind of things they find half digested in whales at times or floating dead and rotten and half eaten by fish. Suppose one caught hold and wouldn't let go! And had the clockwork really been sufficiently tested? But whether he wanted to go on or to go back mattered not the slightest now. In fifty seconds everything was as black as night outside, except where the beam from his light struck through the waters and picked out every now and then some fish or scrap of sinking matter. They flashed by too fast for him to see what they were. Once, he thinks, he passed a shark. And then the sphere began to get hot by friction against the water. They had underestimated this, it seems. The first thing he noticed was that he was per- spiring, and then he heard a hissing grow- ing louder under his feet and saw a lot of little bubbles, very little bubbles they were, rushing upward like a fan, through the wa- ter outside. Steam! He felt the window, and it was hot. He turned on the minute glow lamp that lit his own cavity, looked at the padded watch by the studs, saw he had been traveling now for two minutes. It came into his head that the window would crack through the conflict of tem- peratures, for he knew the bottom water is very near freezing. Then suddenly the floor of the sphere seemed to press against his feet, the rush of bubbles outside grew slower and slower and the hissing dimin- ished. The sphere rolled a little. The win- dow had not cracked, nothing had given, and he knew that the dangers of sinking, at any rate, were over. In gnother minute or so he would be on the floor of the abyss. He thought, he said, of Steevens and Wey- tridge and the rest of them five miles over- head, higher to him than the very highest clouds that ever floated over land are to us, steaming slowly and staring down and won- dering what had happened to him. He peered out of the window. There were no more bubbles now, and the hissing had stopped. Outside there was a heavy black- ness as black as black velvet, except whera the electric light pierced the empty water and showed the color of it a yellow green. ‘Then three things like shapes of fire swam into sight, following each other through the water. Whether they were little and near or big and far off he could not tell. Each Was outlined in a bluish light almost as bright as the lights of a fishing smack, a lght which seemed to be smoking faintly, and all along the sides of them were specks of this, like the lighted portholes of a ship. ‘Their phosphorescence seemed to go out as they came into the radiance of his lamp, and he saw then that they were little fish of some strange sort with huge heads, vast eyes and dwindling bodies and tails. Their eyes were turned toward him, and he judged they were following him down. He sup- posed they were attracted by his glare. Presently others of the same sort joined them. As he went on down he noticed that the water became of a pallid color, and that little specks twinkled in his ray like motes in a sunbeam. This was probably due to the clouds of ooze and mud that the impact of his leaden sinkers had disturbed. By the time he was drawn down to tha lead weights he was in a dense fog of white that his electric Mght failed alto- gether to pierce for more than a few yards, and many minutes elapsed before the hang- ing sheets of sediment subsided to any ex- tent, Then, lit by his light and the tran- fishes, he was able to see under the huge blackness of the superincumbent water an undulating expanse of h-white ooze, broken here and there tangled thickets of a growth of sea lilies, waving hungry siont phosphorescence of a distant shoal of | — tentacles in the air. Further away were the graceful, translucent outlines of a group of gigantic ree ty About this floor the: :e were scattered ,e tling, fi tish tufts of rich pprple and Diack, which he decided must some sort of sea ur- chin, and small, ljfge-eyed or blind things having a curious ‘resemblance some to woodlice and othéts to lobsters, crawled sluggishly across the track of the light and vanished into the obscurity again, ieaving furrowed trails betind them. Then sud- denly the hoverit ‘swarm of little fishes veered about and’ dame toward him as a flight’ of starlings might do. They passed cver him like a phosphorescent snow, and then he saw behing ‘them some larger crea- tures advancing toward the sphere. At first he could see if only dimly, a faintly moving figure rerzotely suggestive of a walking man, and@ then it came into the spray of light that‘the lamp shot out. As the glare struck jt, it shut its eyes, daz- zled. He stared tit figid astonishment. PART III. It was a strange yertebrated animal. Its dark purple head was dimly suggestive of a chameleon, but it had such a high fore- head and such a braincase as no reptile ever displayed befcre: the vertical pitch of its face gave it a most extraordinary re- semblance to a human being. Two large and protruding eyes projected from sockets in chameleon fashion, and it had a broad reptilian mouth, with horny lps beneath its little nostrils. In the position of the ears were two huge gill covers, and out of these floated a branching tree of coralline filaments almost like the tree-like gills that very young rays and sharks possess. But the humanity of the face was not the most extraordinary thing about the creature; it was a biped, its almost globular body was polsed on a tripod of two frog-like legs,and a long, thick tail, and its fore iimbs, whicn grotesquely caricatured the human hand, much as a frog’s do, carried a long shaft of bone tipped with copper. The color of the creature was variegated, its head, hands and legs were purple, but its skin, which hung loosely upon ft, even as clothes might do, was a phosphorescent gray. And it stood there, blinded by the light. At last this unknown creature of the waves blinked its eyes open, and, shad- ing them with its disengaged hand, opencd its mouth and gave vent to a shouting noise, articulate almost as speech might be, that penetrated even the steel case and padded jacket of the sphere. It then moved sideways cut of the glare into the mystery of shadow that bordered it on either side, and Elstead felt, rather than saw, that it was coming toward him. Fan- cying the light had attracted it, he turned the switch that cut off the current. In an- other moment something soft dabbed upon the steel and the globe swayed. Then the shcuting was repeated, and it seemed to him that a distant echo answer- He Saw Two Pair’of Stnlked Eyes. ed it. The dabbing recurred and the globe swayed and ground against the spindle over which the wire was rolled. He stood in the blackness ‘an@ peered out into the everlasting night of the abyss. And pres- ently he saw, very faint and remote, other phosphorescent quasi-human forms hurry- ing toward him. Hardly knowing what he did, he felt about in his swaying prison for the stud of the exterior electric light ard came by accident against his own small glow lamp in its added recess. The sphere twisted and then threw him down; he heard shouts liké shouts of surprise, and when he rose to ‘his feet he saw two pairs of stalked eyes peering into the lower window and reflecting’ his light. . In another mortent hands were dabbihg vigorously at his’ steel casing, ‘and ‘thére was a sound, horrible enough in his ‘posi- ton, of the metal protection of the clock- work being vigorously hammered. That, indeed, sent his heart into his mouth, for if these strange creatures succeeded in stopping that, his release would never. oc- cur. Scarcely had he thought as much when he felt the sphere sway violently and the floor of it press hard against his feet. He turned off the small.glow lamp that lit the interior, and sent the ray of the large lght In the separate compartment out into the water. The sea floor and the man-like creatures had disappeared, and a couple of fish chasing each other dropped suddenly by the window. He thought at once that these strange denizens of the deep sea had broken the wire rope and that he had escaped. He drove up faster and faster, and then stop- ped with a jerk that sent him flying against the padded roof of his prison. For half a minute, perhaps, he was too astonished to think. Then he felt that the sphere was spinning slowly and rocking, and it seemed to him that it was also being drawn through the water. By crouching close to the window he managed to make his weight effective and roll that part of the sphere downward, but he could see nothing save the pale ray of his light striking down ineffectively into the darkness. It occurred to him that he could see more if he turned the lamp off and allowed his eyes to grow accustomed to the profound obscurity. In this he was wise. After some minutes the velvety blackness became a translucent blackness, and then far away, and as faint as the zodiacal light of an English summer evening, he saw shapes moving below. He judged these creatures had detached his cable and were towing him along the sea bottom. And then he saw something faint and remote across the undulations of the submarine plain, a broad horizon of pale luminosity that extended this way and that way as far as the range of his little window permitted him to see. To this he was being towed, as a balloon might be towed by men out of the open country into a town. He approached it very slowly, and very slowly the dim irradiatign was gathered together into more definite shapes. It was nearly 5 o'clock before he came over this luminous area, and by that time he could make out an arrangement sug- gestive of strects and houses grouped about @ vast roofless erection that was grotesque- ly suggestive of a ruined abbey. It was spread out like a map below him. ‘The houses were all roofless inclosures of walls, and their substance being, as he afterward saw, of phosphorescent bones, gave the place an appearance as if it were built of drowned moonshine. Among the inner caves of the place waving trees of ‘ crinoids stretched their tentacles, and tall slender glassy sponges shot like shining minarets and lilies of filmy light out of the general glow of the city. In the open spaces of the place he could see a stirring movement as of crowds of people, ,but he was too many fathoms above them fo distinguish the in- dividuals in those; crowds. hen slowly they pulled him down, and as they did so the, details of the place qrept slowly upon his apprehension. He saw that the courses of the glpudy buildings were marked out with beaded lines of round ob- jects, and then he;pereeived that at several points below him 4n broad open spaces were forms like the encrusted shapes of ships. Slowly and surely he was drawn down, and the forms below him bacame brighter, clear- er and more distinct. .He was being pulled down, he perceived, towards the large build- ing in the center of the town, and he could catch a glimpse ever and again of the mul- titudinous forms that were lugging at his cord. He was astonished to see that the rigging of one of the-ships which formed such a prominent feature of the place was crowded with « host of geaticulating figures regarding him, and then the walls of the great building rose about him silently and hid tke city from his eyes, And such walls they were! of water- logged wood, and twisted wire rope, and iron spars, and copper, and the bones and skulls of dead men. The skulls ran in zig-zag lines and spirals and fantastic curves over the building, and in and out of their eye sockets, and over the whole surface of the place lurked and played @ multitude of silvery Httle fishes. Sud- denly his ears were filled with a low shout- ing and @ noise like the violent blowing of horns, and this gave place to a fan- tastic chant. Down the sphere sank, past the huge pointed windows, through which he saw de great number of these strange ghost-! people regarding him, and at les* he came to rest, as it seemed, on a kind of altar that stood in the center of the place. . And now he was at such a@: level, that he could see those strange people of the abyss plainly once more. To his astonish- ment he perceived that they were prostrat- ing themselves before him, all save one, dressed, as it seemed, in a robe of placoid scales and crowned with a luminous dia- dem, who stood with his reptilian mouth opening and shutting, as though he led ihe chanting of the worshipers. A curious im- pulse made Elstead turn on his small glow lamp again, so that he became visible to those creatures of the abyss, albeit the glare made them disappear forthwith into the night. At this sudden sight of him the chanting gave place to a tumult of ex- ultant shouts, and Elstead, being anxious to watch them, turned his light off again and vanished from before their eyes. But for a time he was too blind to make out what they were doing, and when at last he Slowly and Surely He Was Drawn Down. could distingvish them they were kneeling again. And then they continued worship- ing him, without rest .r intermission, f the space of three hours. Most circumstantial was Elstead’s ac- count of this astounding city and its peo- ple, these people uf perpetual night, who have never seen stn or mocn or stars, green vegetation nor any living, air- breathing creatures, who know nothing of fire nor any light but the phosphorescent light of Living things. Startling as is his story, it is yet more starthng to find that clentific men of such eminence as Adams and Jenkins find nothing incredible in it. They tell me they see no reason why intel- ligent, water-breathing, vertebrated crea- tures inured to a low temperature and enormous pressure and of such a heavy structure that neither alive nor dead would they float, might not live upon the bottom of the deep sea and, quite unsuspected by us, descendants like ourselves of the great Theriomorpha of the New Red Sand- stone age. We should be known to them, however, as strange meteoric creatures wont to fall catastrophically dead out of the mysterioua blackness of their watery sky. And net only we ourselves, but our ships, our metals, our appliances, would come ra:nirg dewr. out of the night. Some- times sinking things would smite down and crush them. as if it were the judg- ment of some unseen power edove, and sometimes would come things of the ut- most rarity or utility or shapes of inspir- ing suggestion. One can understand, per- haps, something of their behavior at the descent of a living man, if one thinks what barbaric people might do, to whcm an en- haloed shining creature came suddenly out f the sky. Slat one tine or another Elste ad probably told the officers of the Ptarmigan every detail of his strange twelve hours in the abyss. That he also intended to write them down is certain, but he never did, and so, unhappily, we have to piece to- ments of his gether the discrepant fra story from the reminiscences of manded Simmons, Weybridge, Steevens, Lindley and the others. We se2 the thing darkly in fragmentary glimpses; the hug’ ghcetly building, the bowing, chanting peo- ple with their dusk chameleon-like head and faintly luminous clothing, and E!- stead with his light turned or again, vain- ly trying to convey to their minds that the cord by which the sphere was held was to be severed. Minute after minute slipped away, and Elstead, looking at his watch, was horrified te find that he had oxygen enly for two hours more. But the chant in his honor kept on as remorselessly as if it was the marching song of his approach- ing death. The manner of his release he does not understand, but to judge by the end of the ccrd that hung from the sphere, it had teen cut through by rubbing against the edge of the altar. Abruptly the sphere rolled over and he swept up, out of their world, as an ethereal creature clothed in @ vacuum would sweep through our own atmosphere back to its native ether again. He must have tora out of their sight as a hydrogen but ble hastens upward from our alr. A strange ascension it must have seemed to them. The sphere rushed up with even greater velocity than when weighted with the lead sinkers it had rushed down. It became exceedingly hot. It drove up with the windows uppermost, and he remembers the torrent of bubbles frothing against the glass. Every moment he expected this to fly. Then suddenly something like a huge wheel seemed to be released in his head, and the padded compartment began spinning about him, and h2 fainted. His next recol- lection was of his cabin, and of ihe doc- tor’s voice. But that is the substance of the extra- ordinary story that Elstead related in fragments to the oificers of the Ptarmigan. He promised to write it all down at a later date. His mind was chiefly occupied with the improvement of his apparatus, which was effected at Rio. It remains only to tell that on February 2, 1896, he made his second descent into the ocean abyss, with the improvements his first experience sug- gested. What happened we shall prob- ably never know. He never returned. The Ptarmigan beat about over the point of his submersion, seeking him in vain, for thirteen days. Then she returned to Rio and the news was telegraphed to his friends. So the maiter remains for the present. But it is hardly probable that no further attempt will be made to verify his strange story of these hitherto unsuspected cities of the deep sea. (The End.) ———__++—____ How He Died. A striking story of Gettysburg is told by General Doubleday and published in the Chicago Times-Herald. ‘An officer of the 6th Wisconsin Regiment waiked up to Col. Dawes, who was in command—Col. Bragg was in Washington cn crutches. The offi- cer was very erect and very pale. Dawes and Doubleday both thought he was com- ing with a report to receive orders. But he was not. He°had a favor to ask. ‘Colonel,’ he said to Dawes, ‘will you tell the foiks at home I died as u man and a soldier should?’ Then he unbuttoned his coat. His whole side was shot away. It was his last effort. He died standing. Highest of all in Leavening Power.— Latest U.S. Gov't Report Ro A CHILD POET. Little Miss Mauro of Washington Gains Magazine Fame. Lite Miss Margaret Frances Mauro of Washington makes her first appearance as a magazine contributor in the midsummer number of St. Nicholas. Two pages of the magazine are dedicated to poems from the pen of this gifted little lady, together with her picture, and the editor of St. Nicholas finds the work worthy of special editorial notice. Margaret Frances Mauro is not yet four- teen years old. She is the daughter of Philip Mauro of this city. The poems pub- lished in St. Nicholas were written when she was ten years old, and are remarkable for both thought and grace of expression. The young writer gave signs of this re- markable gift by writings in both prose and verse when she was but six years old. She made her literary debut in The Star four years ago. The appesrance of her first work “in type” encouraged her in her efforts, which now give promise of early fame. The following verses are selected from the poems published in St. Nicholas: The Monster fel monster, “*Practising,”” Looms up before my "view, And In a voice I must obey He calls me from my pleasant play. home from school, ¢ he summons me In sternest voi Straight to the piano stool: There. whiie my chords and scales I try, ie I count the moments passing If Tan. ont of sorts And crossly strike a key With atiscord most unbearable He then docs punish me. He'll worry me with all bis might Unti. my exercise gues right. Ther tell me that tn time ‘Th re'll be a smile upon that face That now does scare me so; His ugliness will flee, and I ‘Will grow to love him—by and by. And so, perhaps, if I Am good and persevere, And do my lessons right and try Not offend his sar, 0.4 “Practising” will grow to me As pleasant as they say he'll be. The Shadow Song. je phant One moment swift careering Across the sunny meadow, ‘Then, fitting, disappearing — Who knows where? Toward thee bend the grasses, The tall, tall meadow grasses, As if to hold thy flitting figure stil; Now them ling’ring, brooding, Thou temptest thelr caresses, Then dartest off, eluding— Mocking still. NOTHING NEW. The Ancient Egypt Wrestlea With the Hease Servant Problem. Paris Correspondence of the London Telegraph. Thanks to the exertions of the Egyptian exploration fund, the beginning of the servant girl difficulty has been traced somewhat farther back than the advent of boarding schools, a date to which cer- tain unthinking persons usually assign it. A very interesting collection of papyri found last winter in Egypt is now on view at the Society of Antiquaries’ premises in Burlington house, and many of these deal with the every-day life of the peoples who lived along the Nile 2,000 years ago. Even at that remote period the domestic servant question had reached the acute stage. One of the time-worn documents unearthed by Mecsrs. Hunt and Grenfell at Kom-el-Qatl states that “David has taken Thacsia back on condition that she returns to her work and busies herself with its duties: other- wise I shall put her in prison.” The charge from the first to the third person probably marks David's rising wrath at the thought cf his recalcitrant “help” re- trainirg contumacious. The beer duty, too, was a subject of some difficulty, and one Psammetichus, who was the revnue officer of the day, places on reccrd the fact that two brewers had at last paid him the duty on their nectar for a year. Next to the servant girl diffi- culty, the question of rates, rent and taxes Seems to have most bothered the ancient Egyptian, and his receipts were preserved with scrupulous care. Probably the tax- gatkerer had a bad memory, and it was just as well to keep something to refresh it when he called absent-mindedly a second t'me. A schoolboy’s copy book, with a composition in very bad Greek, was also found, and it would seem that the unhappy youth had to write “lines” from a letter of the Emperor Hadrian as punishment for his errors. The theme winds up with a very sound moral pointing out that “Thus does heaven ever bring the wicked to ju: tice.” A banker's ledger gives the names of his depositors and the sums they with- drew from their accounts; and generally the discoveries of the explorers in Egypt show that the world has not advanced very far during the last 2,000 years. Pat's Clean Hit. ago News. ‘he Irishman when called upon to rea- son out a problem often makes a short cut toward the answer and thereby proves that “brevity is the soul of wit.” One day- as Pat, a water carrier who supplied the little village with water from the river, halted at the top of the bank a man famous for his inquisitive mind stop- ped and asked: “How long have you hauled water for the village, my good man?” “Tin years or more, sorr,” was the ready answer. “Ah, yes! How many loads do you take in a day?” “From tin to fifteen, sor.” “Ah! Now I have a problem for you. How much water at that rate have you hauled in all, sir?” Pat promptly jerked his thumb back- ward toward the river and replied: the wather you don’t see there now, al WALID ABSOLUTELY PURE Baking Powder CAUCE TIN HER OWN TRAP A Jealous Wife Resorted to a ttle Trick That Was Well Carr’ | From the Detrolt Free Press Mrs. Pringle had been married just six months and would have been blissfully hap- but she was one of those women who never can let well enough alone. She was inclined to be jealous of Mr. Pringle an was filled with surmises that foundation. But she decided to set a trap for him, and it never occurred to her that she might possibly fall into it herself. One day when Mr. Pringle went home to dinner his wife handed him a note ad no actual which she said had been left for him that mo ing. He opened it, and after scanning hastily, thrust it indifferently into pocket, “Anything important?” asked bis wife in a tone trembling with exciter ©. A business matter, t ou ‘seem well pleased | w gested Mrs. Pringle. Mr. Pringle laughed. sug- He also His wife detected evidences of conscio is biushed. guilt in the fact that he did not offer to show her the letter. Yes, she thought she bad him safely trapped, and the knowledge made her utterly wretched. Mr. Pringle read the note over again on his way to the office: “Dear Sir: I have often seen and admired you from a distance and would be greatly teased to make your acquaintance. Mest me this afternoon at 4 at the approach to Belle Isle bridge. I will wear a blue dress and carry a bunch of pink roses. “ADMIRER.” At the hour specified the woman in the blue dress was there. A man—who was not Mr. Pringle—walked up to her. “L have your note,” he began, but she turaed on him like a fury. “How dare you speak to me? I am here to meet my hus- ba: d by appointmen’ ‘I guess not. You are here to meet Mr. Pringle, who sent me to see what you “Wretch! If you address another wor’ to Mme I'll call for help.” “Excuse me, but if Mr. Prindle had ex- pected to meet his wife I am sure he would have come.” Mrs. Pringle took a passing car and went home. She had changed her dres ter wouldn't have melted in when Mr. Pringle came in. She thinks she has proved her husband to be a mo.lel of rectitude, but she doesn't know that he Spotted “Admirer” at the first glimpse of her disguised handwriting. A BUTTERFLY CATC R rze W. Dunn Chasing the Idlers the Richest Man in the World. From the San Francisco Examiner. Chasing butterflies for the est man in the world is now the occupation of one of the most striking looking characters scen in the streets of Los Angeles. He is eighty-two years old, keen-eyed, straight and vigorous, with the step and alertness of a man whose life has been spent out of doors. His name is George W. Dunn, and he has been snaring buttorilies since 149, when he came to the state is a naiu- ralist of the Audubon type. knows all the books by heart, but he knows better than all the book of nature, and has speut his existence turning its leaves. He searched the fields and forests of all the Pacific states, of British Columbia, Lower California, Mexico and South America, and has twelve times tramped over Central America—always after plancs and insects. Over at Trig, England, tiv-s an old man who is chiefly known to the world oecause of his immense wealth, but who, if he were poor, would be famous because of his re- searches and knowledge as a uratist. He is the Baron de Rotaschild, and at Trig he has a large three-story building, which he is filling with entomological Spect- mens. He heard of Mr. Dunn some time ago, and has employed him to make a col- lection on this coast and Mexico. Dunn has already several thousand butterflies ready to ship to August Belmont at New York, who will forward them to Trig. Each | placed in a three-cornered envelope. so w) ranged that the delicate inclosure cannot be injured. In a few days h> will leave for Revila Gigedo, on the east coast of Mexico. He has an indefinite commission, and will be a long time compieting the baron’s collection. As he appears certain to be good for half a century more of lite, he does not need to hurry. Indes4, he says the philosophy of life is this—live slowly. ——— eee A Dialect Vic! From the Cleveland Plaindealer. A Prospect street dame engaged a new coachman not long ago. He was new ina double sense, having but recently brought himself and his mixed dialect accent across the briny from Liverpool. One day it oc- curred to the good lady to find out some- ting definite about John’s family. nd your father, John, what was he “Thanky kindly, ma'am,” said the coach- man, “feyther was a seeker like, ma’am, fer the ‘errin’.” “He means a_clergymar, thought the good dame. aloud: nd was he ordained?” think he wor, ma'am,” said the coach- man, though they didn’t ’ave the smallpox much to speak of where he came from, an’ I don’t know whether it took or not. And now the good lady takes great de- light In telling her acquaintances that her rew coachman is'the son of an English dis- senting clergyman. Some day she will rudely awaken to the fact that the ‘errin’ are not sinners, but fish, ——_+--—____ What He Would Like. From the Chicago Post. She blushed prettily as she told the sister of her best young man that she thought she would buy a birthday present for him. “You know him better than I do,” she said, “90 I came to you for advice.” “Yes?” sald the sister inguiringly. “Oh, yes, indeed. What would you advise me to get?” “Oh, I don’t know,” carelessly. “I could only advise you in gen- eral termi From what I know of him, howeve-, he will appreciate something that can be easily pawned better than some- thing that cannot. of course, Then she said replied the sister 2S iter—"What is the charge against the prisoner, Officer Orion?” : = Tine stomer, "the: Wari tmeonone tae’ men eceeeeasaete oe tik maniac” Shea