kless adventure before me. The Martian weather for the moment was lovely and the many-coloured grass l

u like a crushed white flower in the red grip of those cruel ravishers came upon me, and then pausing t

air to them with a noise so like to a girl sobbing that again and again I stopped in the tangled path to listen. There were green bladder-mosses which swam about the surface of the still pools like gigantic frog-broods. There were on the ridges warrior trees burning in the vindictiveness of a long forgotten cause-a blaze of crimson scimitar thorns from root to topmost twig; and down again in the cool hollows were lady-bushes making twilight of the green gloom with their

ame all too soon there was still undulating forest everywhere, vistas of fairy glades on every hand, peopled with incredible things and ec

omorrow," as An would have said; and with this for comfort I selected a warm, sandy hollow under the roots of

thing to do till the white haze had lifted and made it possible to start again,

e brighten and shine down on me with a soft sea-green radiance. The sunward sides of the tree-stems took a glow, and the dew that ran dripping down their mossy sides trickled blood-red to earth. Elsewhere the shadows were still black, and strange things began to mov

d, ivory white, cushioned in leaves, and secured to its place by naked white roots that clipped the branch like fingers of a lady's hand. Even as I looked it opened, a pale white star, and hung pensive and inviting on its mossy cushion. From it came such a ravishing

. He perched near by, and peeped and peered until he made out the flower pining on her virgin stem, whereat off he hopped to her bran

gerness. He got a grip of the tree and up he went, "hand over hand," root over root. I had just time to note others of his species had dropped here and there upon the ground, and were hurrying with frantic haste to the same destination when he reached the fatal branch, and was straddling victoriously down it, blind to all but love and longing. That ill-omened bird who stood above the maiden-flower let him come within a stalk's length, so near that the white splendour of his sleeping lady gleamed within arms' reach, then the great beak was opened, the great claws made a clutch, the gallant's head was yanked from his neck, and as it went tumbling down the maw of the feathered thing his white legs fell spinnin

from the wonders about me, I set off at best pace along the well-trodden pa

pleasantest sights in nature-and thus I came right out on top of the hamlet before there had been an indication of its presence. It occupied two sides of a pretty little bay, the third

edness. My first idea was that they were bathing, and fixing my eyes on the tree-tops with great propriety, I gave a warning cough. At that sound instead of getting to cover, or clothes, all started up and stood staring for a time like a herd of startled cattle. It was highly embarrassing; they were right in the path, a round dozen of them, naked and so little ashamed that w

eller who had c

es

er was on the road, and had come a little way down the

y might they help me out of my clothes? It was hot, and these things were cumbersome." As to the eating, I was agreeable enough seeing how casual

ig tree and produced their stores of never failing provisions. After a pleasant little meal taken thus in the open and with all the

they are grown?" asked an i

ty. "Built, you mean. Never in my

little! You have come from afar, from some barbarous and barren district. Here we undoubtedly grow our boats, and though we know the Thither folk and such uncultivated races make their craft

us take the stranger to the boat garden now. The current will drift us round the bay, and we can come back when it tur

were upon inside and out. I noted with a seaman's admiration its lightness, elasticity, and supreme sleekness, its marvellous buoyancy and fairy-like "lines," and after some minutes' consideration it suddenly flashed across me that it was all of gourd

hand as she spoke, in the simple-hearted way of her people, "I see you ha

o sea in a hollowed-out pumpkin, and with a young lady-well, dressed as you are-for crew. Even now I cannot imagine how you

attering like finches in the evening, showed how they planted their gourd seed, nourished the gigantic plants as they grew with brackish water and the burnt ashes; then, when they flowered, mated the male and female blossoms, glorious funnels of golden hue big enough for one to live in; and when the young fruit was of the bigness of an ordinary bolster, how they slipped it into a double mould of open reed-work something like the two halves of a walnut-shell; and how, gro

process was sufficiently advanced, they loosened the casing, and cutting a hole into the interior of each giant fruit, scooped out all its seed, thereby checking more advance, and throwing into the rind strength that would otherwise have gone to reproductiveness. They said each fruit made two vessels, but the upper half was always best and used for long salt-water jour

wn; and the Martian twilight, owing to the comparative steepness of the little planet's sides, being brief, we strolled back to the village, and there they gave me harbourage for t