"It is the bisected edge of the earth crevice," he said. "That overhanging upright bluff reaches towards the external surface of the earth, the land of your former home. That shelving approach beneath is the entrance to the 'Inner Circle,' the concavity of our world." Again we approached the visible substance, moving gently under the will of my guide. The shore became more distinctly outlined as we advanced, inequalities that were before unnoticed became perceptible, and the silver-like material resolved itself into ordinary earth. Then I observed, upright and motionless, on the edge of the shore that reached toward the inner shell of earth, towards that "Unknown Country" beyond, a figure in human form. "Is that a mortal?" I asked. "Are we nearing humanity again?" "It is a being of mortal build, a messenger who awaits our coming, and who is to take charge of your person and conduct you farther," he replied. "It has been my duty to crush, to overcome by successive lessons your obedience to your dogmatic, materialistic earth philosophy, and bring your mind to comprehend that life on earth's surface is only a step towards a brighter existence, which may, when selfishness is conquered, in a time to come, be gained by mortal man, and while he is in the flesh. The vicissitudes through which you have recently passed should be to you an impressive lesson, but the future holds for you a lesson far more important, the knowledge of spiritual, or mental evolution which men may yet approach; but that I would not presume to indicate now, even to you. Your earthly body has become a useless shell, and when you lay it aside, as you soon can do, as I may say you are destined to do, you will feel a relief as if an abnormal excrescence had been removed; but you can not now comprehend such a condition. That change will not occur until you have been further educated in the purely occult secrets for which I have partly prepared you, and the material part of your organism will at any time thereafter come and go at command of your will. On that adjacent shore, the person you have observed, your next teacher, awaits you." "Am I to leave you?" I cried in despair, for suddenly the remembrance of home came into my mind, and the thought, as by a flash, that this being alone could guide me back to earth. "Recall your words, do not desert me now after leading me beyond even alchemistic imaginings into this subterranean existence, the result of what you call your natural, or pure, ethereal lessons." He shook his head. "I beg of you, I implore of you, not to abandon me now; have you no compassion, no feeling? You are the one tie that binds me to earth proper, the only intelligence that I know to be related to a human in all this great, bright blank." Again he shook his head. [Illustration: "SUSPENDED IN VACANCY, HE SEEMED TO FLOAT."]