"It formed an equally striking scene. I turned to my companion and asked him how it was that the mathematicians, chemists, physicists, astronomers, were so crowded together. He said, 'The Patenta covers, with all its buildings, a space about one mile square, and here in laboratories and in the great observatories these men have flocked because of a sympathy in their tastes and talents. Although astronomy is the great profession, and, as I will show you, the marvels of the Universe are being more and more fully known, yet the study of the elements and the laws of matter is popular and also followed unremittingly. It is true that we know these people are from your earth; they have reported all that to the Registeries, to whom I will soon conduct you; they yet retain strong memories of the earth, though it is confined more largely to knowledge than to experience. In some, the Martian life and habit has almost obliterated their earthly notions and designs. It is singular that of the scientific workers of the earth the astronomers, physicists, and chemists alone reach Mars. The biologists, zoologists, botanists, geographers, and geologists rarely are booked at the Registeries as coming from the Earth. Their lives may be prolonged elsewhere, they seldom reach us. "'There are some exceptions. The plants of Mars are numerous, its rocks and animal life curious, and they are well understood. A few doctors from the earth are here, but medicine and surgery are not so much needed, yet in the study of life our philosophers have made great strides. Your thinkers and poets, artists, composers, dramatists, musicians, come here, but of all the wonderful students of Nature the earth has produced, as far as I know or have heard, Lamarck and Agassiz, Owen, and Cuvier alone have been reincarnated on our globe. And the warriors and generals of the earth are unknown here.' "We had reached a table unnoticed, unheard. There was a constant rush of words about us. The melodic charm of the Martian tongue, like the soft vocalization of Italian pleased me. If the Martians are without books or papers, they possess all the resources of conversation. Animation, pleasure, salutation, cheerfulness and joy was everywhere, the perfume of flowers filled the air, the shafts of sunlight broken into the most enticing iridescence filled the great noble rooms with lovely colors, and the clear white tables, beautifully spread with fruit, seemed to chasten appetite into something ethereal and rare.