“Oh, I see, that’s what puzzles you, Bogardus,” said Acquilla, smiling. “Of course the New York you see is built on the ruins of two other civilizations. The immense buildings you speak of are buried in these artificial heights. It’s like Rome, you know, that was built and rebuilt on the ruins of former cities. New York, of course, has been twice destroyed. Once in 1984, at the period of the European conquest and again in 2080, when it was voluntarily levelled under the first years of the Matriarchal era.” She gave a quick glance, noting probably the rising excitement in my eyes and fearing too great a strain on my dizzy imagination, said, “Enough for the moment, Bogardus. You will have to accustom yourself to many things. Close your eyes now and don’t ask any more questions.” Her arm drew my head to her shoulder. Her warm lips closed my eyelids. Intoxicated, I yielded again to her superior strength. Indeed my head was in such a state of turbulent anarchy that I began to be afraid for my reason. “There, poor dear. I’ve been terribly thoughtless in tiring you like this. Relax now and I’ll promise to take better care of you in the future.” When I opened my eyes again we had come to rest in front of a long Georgian villa of some colored material in the midst of a charming English park. “Home at last. You must have fallen asleep, Bogardus.” Acquilla’s arms slipped under me and raising me tenderly from the car, set me down on the steps where a dozen lengthy dogs of a variety unfamiliar to me immediately fawned at my side. Acquilla leaned over and pulled a series of levers. The car immediately moved off lightly to a hangar in the elms about a half a mile down the lawn. “Can you walk? A little weak? Take my arm. An electric bath will set you up.” She glanced backwards over the green vista and then at the clear sky, “We’re down just before the rain.” “Why there isn’t a cloud in the sky,” I could not help exclaiming. “Look.” I followed the direction of her hand and perceived some ten miles distant a score of gigantic pylons, which I calculated must be at least three to four thousand feet in height, about whose soaring tops light lavender clouds were piling up, until presently the whole sky was veiled in a purplish mist through which long electric streamers were playing. “What, you are enabled to generate rain by electricity?” I cried suddenly enlightened. “Oh, we have been able to control the weather for over fifty years,” Acquilla announced in a matter-of-fact way. “We do all our raining at night of course. Every day is just like what you have witnessed.” “I can understand your bringing on a rain storm. Even in my day we had developed that principle. But how are you able to prevent storms?”