"The same glorious beauty I had known on earth covered her, and like a mystic light shone from her face and person. I was myself again, young, and she was the same. The impelling sense of a superhuman Destiny bringing us together again in this new world, forced from me an ejaculation of thankfulness. The cry was not loud, but audible to her ears, and she turned toward us. Yes! it was Martha, as I knew her in those raptured days of love on the banks of the Hudson before disease and weakness and age had stolen the bloom from her cheeks, the light from her eyes, and the fair presentiment of charm and perfection from her body. She did not see me perhaps clearly. Certainly she did not recognize me. An instant's scrutiny and her face turned again to the open exposure of hill and field, stream and cloud-flecked sky. "Alca had observed my gestures of delight, and, perhaps reading my thoughts by that intuition of mind so wonderful in the Martians, pushed me toward her gently and moved away from us toward the brink of the river. "I stood for a moment hesitating, overwhelmed with the marvel of this new thing. I stole on, and finally pushing aside the high grown grass, was at her side--at the side of the very form and feature of the woman who had taught me on earth the worth of living and the meaning and the glory of rectitude. "She was breathing fast, her bosom rising and falling with quick respirations, and her cheeks flushed with color, made a delicious foil to the pearly tone of her face, concealed on her neck and forehead by the escaping tresses of her dark hair. "I drew back, trembling with anticipation, my heart beating, and my clasped hands folded on my breast in an agony of restraint. She was talking, talking to herself in the low musical voice of the Martians. The wind had ceased, a dark shadow from a crossing cloud moved toward us from the river over the blue sprinkled field, a haze stole upward from the farther view, and, bending at the margin of the water the figure of Alca bathed in light, seemed to watch us like some calm incarnate response to my own hopes and prayers.