Cautiously we pushed our way through the hedge, which was composed of shrubs as large as small trees, and very thick at the bottom, and, having traversed it, found ourselves in a great meadow-like expanse which might have been a lawn. At a considerable distance, in the midst of a clump of trees, a large building towered skyward, its walls of some red metal, gleaming like polished copper in the soft light that fell from the cloud dome. There were no lights around the building itself, and we saw nothing corresponding to windows on that side which faced us, but toward the right a door was evidently open, and out of this streamed a brilliant shaft of illumination, which lay bright upon the lawn, then crossed the highway through an opening in the hedge, and gleamed on the water of the canal beyond. Where we stood the ground had evidently been recently cleared, and there was no obstruction, but as we crept closer to the house--for our curiosity had now become irresistible--we found ourselves crawling through grass so tall that if we had stood erect it would have risen well above our heads. Taking Precautions. "This affords good protection," said Colonel Smith, recalling his adventures on the Western plains. "We can get close in to the Indians--I beg pardon, I mean the Martians--without being seen." Heavens, what an adventure was this! To be crawling about in the night on the face of another world and venturing, perhaps, into the jaws of a danger which human experience could not measure! But on we went, and in a little while we had emerged from the tall grass and were somewhat startled by the discovery that we had got close to the wall of the building. Carefully we crept around toward the open door. As we neared it we suddenly stopped as if we had been stricken with instantaneous paralysis. Out of the door floated, on the soft night air, the sweetest music I have ever listened to. A Monstrous Surprise. It carried me back in an instant to my own world. It was the music of the earth. It was the melodious expression of a human soul. It thrilled us both to the heart's core. "My God!" exclaimed Colonel Smith. "What can that be? Are we dreaming, or where in heaven's name are we?" Still the enchanting harmony floated out upon the air. What the instrument was I could not tell; but the sound seemed more nearly to resemble that of a violin than of anything else I could think of. Magnificent Music. When we first heard it the strains were gentle, sweet, caressing and full of an infinite depth of feeling, but in a little while its tone changed, and it became a magnificent march, throbbing upon the air in stirring notes that set our hearts beating in unison with its stride and inspiring in us a courage that we had not felt before. Then it drifted into a wild fantasia, still inexpressibly sweet, and from that changed again into a requiem or lament, whose mellifluous tide of harmony swept our thoughts back again to the earth.