Of the three great kingdoms that hold dominion on the surface of the globe, the mineral, the vegetable and the animal, one alone was represented on the lunar sphere: the mineral, the whole mineral, and nothing but the mineral.
"Why!" exclaimed Ardan, with a disconcerted look, after a long and searching examination, "I can't find anybody.

Everything is as motionless as a street in Pompeii at 4 o'clock in the morning!" [Illustration: THE SOLUTION STILL ESCAPED HIM.] "Good comparison, friend Ardan;" observed M'Nicholl.

"Lava, slag, volcanic eminences, vitreous matter glistening like ice, piles of scoria, pitch black shadows, dazzling streaks, like rivers of light breaking over jagged rocks--these are now beneath my eye--these alone I can detect--not a man--not an animal--not a tree.

The great American Desert is a land of milk and honey in comparison with the joyless orb over which we are now moving.

However, even yet we can predicate nothing positive.