They suddenly found themselves deposited in the centre of a vast square, surrounded by large palatial-looking buildings, public offices, stores, shops, picture-galleries, gigantic blocks of private residences, in flats five-and-twenty storeys high, and other architectural developments of the latest constructive crazes, fashioned, apparently, after the same models, and on similar lines, to those at present so much in vogue in that now distant planet, the Earth. There was a profusion of advertisement-boards, these, in many instances, entirely covering the whole façade of the building with large-lettered announcements of the nature of the trade or business conducted within. An eager and excited crowd thronging the pavements, and hustling each other, without any apparent purpose or aim, was pushing in all directions. "I wonder what all this is about," observed _Mr. Punch_; "suppose we ask a Policeman?" They noticed a being attired in every respect like the familiar guardians of the peace on Earth, except that he carried a harmless and gaily-decked bladder in place of the more serviceable _bâton_, and beckoned to him. He approached with polite alacrity. "You want to know what's up, Gents?" he commenced, divining their purpose instinctively. "It's the Half-Quarterly Meeting of the Solid Gold Extract of Brick-Dust Company. There's been some little talk about the dividend not being quite so good as the prospectus led the shareholders to believe, and as the shares have been mostly taken up by widows and orphans, some of their friends, you see, are a little anxious to hear the Chairman's Report. But, you see, it'll be all right." At this moment a widow, with blanched cheeks and dishevelled hair, who had been listening with an anxious and eager gaze to what the Policeman had been saying, joined the group. _Mr. Punch_ looked at her with mournful sympathy, and slowly turning the ring on his finger, addressed the Policeman. "Tell me, my good man," he said, persuasively, "is that the truth? Is it really all right?" "All right?" rejoined the guardian of the peace in amazement, but apparently unconscious of the purport of his speech, "I should rather think not. Call it 'all wrong' and then you'll about hit it. Why it's well known that the patent's all _fudge_. It's the biggest swindle out. No more in it than in this here bladder. But you'll see; the whole thing's burst, and you'll know it in a minute." The words were scarcely out of his mouth when a roar of a thousand angry voices, followed by a sudden rush from the building of a mad and raging crowd, obliged _Mr. Punch_, for a moment, to pause. When the uproar had somewhat subsided, he turned to the Policeman, and pointed feelingly to the unfortunate widow, who had fallen on to an apple-stall in a fit of hysterics, and, locking his arm in that of his aged companion, proceeded to cross the square. "Give us a song, old 'un!" shouted a portion of the mob, who had followed them.