"The population crowded and the weak and deformed were 'removed.' The remedy was but tentative, and gradually the pressure grew still stronger. As the centuries passed, all the weak, the worthless, and the unfit were sterilised. The pressure still increased. The State then provided for taking charge of all the children, and only the most fit were allowed to become parents. "Under this policy, and under wise management, the State became the 'universal mother.' Parents knew not their offspring, nor the offspring their parents, and the love of humanity and public duty became the inspiring motives of human action. Under this policy, too, have the leading nations of Cavitorus, with the Shadowas in the lead, developed their present civilisation. Under such a policy they have been able to adjust the population to the possibilities of the land, and thus while they have been building their opulent present, they have developed the finest type of people mentally, morally and physically, that ever inhabited this planet. "Oseba explained the quickness of the soil in Cavitorus, the length of the seasons and of the days, with their peculiar irregularities. He described the movements of the sun, its appearance at various seasons of the year, and why it was never entirely dark in those regions. "Then he recited a further tradition, relating that at the time the people reached Cavitorus, the bright star Oree was the 'Pole Star,' that it had moved gradually away, but that in about twenty thousand years it was to return to its old position. Further, that on the return of Oree--the tradition ran--the Shadowas would be released from their seeming isolation, and be reunited with their brethren of the outer world to the presence, or on the surface of, Oliffa. "'You see,' said Oseba, 'in the development of all people their myths and their heroes are strongly allied to, if they are not the actual forces of, Nature, and all have a seasoning of truth as a basis. "'The people had watched Oree; were waiting his return, and were alert for signs of the coming change, or, as they put it, for a "deliverer." They believed from this tradition, that they had been in Cavitorus twenty thousand years, and a confidence in their future deliverance was a deep-seated superstition, a real faith and hope. "'Well, Oree, as seen from the spot where the first "pilgrims landed," as indicated by a peak on a distant mountain, appeared some twenty-five years ago, and, as on the very night the observations were taken a portion of a wrecked vessel was cast upon our shores, no wonder the long-deferred hope found expression in a movement for inquiry and exploration.