When the bell entered the night of the sea-depths they passed into an apparently lifeless zone, where the searchlight, projected now on one side and now on another, revealed no more of the living forms which they had encountered above, but showed only a desert of solid transparent water. Here, amid this awful isolation, they experienced for the first time a feeling of dread and terror. An overpowering sense of loneliness and helplessness came over them, and only the stout heart of Cosmo Versál, and his reassuring words, kept the others from making the signal which would have caused the bell to be hastily drawn back to the Ark. "M. De Beauxchamps," said Cosmo, breaking the impressive silence, "to what depth have we now descended?" "A thousand fathoms," replied the Frenchman, consulting his automatic register. "Good! We have been only thirty minutes in reaching this depth. We shall sink more slowly as we get deeper, but I think we can count upon reaching the bottom in not more than four hours from the moment of our departure. It will require only two hours for them to draw us back again with the powerful engines of the Ark, especially when aided by our propellers. This will leave fourteen hours for our explorations, if we stay out the limit that we have fixed." There was such an air of confidence in Cosmo's manner and words that this simple statement did much to enhearten the others. "The absence of life in this part of the sea," Cosmo continued cheerfully, "does not surprise me. It has long been known that the life of the ocean is confined to regions near the surface and the bottom. We shall certainly find plenty of wonderful creatures below." When they knew that they must be near the bottom they turned the light downward, and every available window was occupied by an eager watcher. Presently a cry of "Look! Look there!" broke from several voices at once. The searchlight, penetrating far through the clear water beneath the bell, fell in a circle round a most remarkable object--tall, gaunt, and spectral, with huge black ribs. "Why, it's the Metropolitan tower, still standing!" cried Amos Blank. "Who would have believed it possible?" "No doubt there was some lucky circumstance about its anchorage," returned Cosmo. "Although it was built so long ago, it was made immensely strong, and well braced, and as the water did not undermine it at the start, it has been favored by the very density of that which now surrounds it, and which tends to buoy it up and hold it steady. But you observe that it has been stripped of the covering of stone." "Would it not be well to utilize it for anchoring the cable?" asked De Beauxchamps. "We could have nothing better," said Cosmo.