In landing the “Meteor” had come to a stop at a point that Carl figured was approximately lower Broadway. Nearby some excavating work was being done by a group of white-bearded men, who at the sight of the airplane dropped their implements and came hurrying towards it. Upon questioning these men Carl learned that they were scientists who had come from the cities that lay in the distant West, to learn something about the civilization that had existed on the Atlantic coast in the days of the past. To the best of their knowledge, they explained, some thousand or so years ago the entire coast had been devastated by great tidal waves, followed by terrible earthquakes causing untold destruction. Volcanic eruptions, too, had added to the havoc, burying the lands, for thousands of square miles, under millions of tons of lava and rock. Leading him to the pit where Carl had first seen them, the excavators asked him to peer down the deep shaft they had dug. At the bottom, some two hundred feet below him, Carl saw the tower of the great Woolworth Building of old New York. Asking them what they sought, the answer came, “Knowledge. We of today have little need for the material things of Life. Ours is a search for the Truth, and we must hurry.” The spokesman of the party pointed heavenward. Carl, following the directing finger with his eyes, saw in blazing brilliance, the great comet whose first appearance had caused Sana and he to flee the earth. While in Europe he had noticed it, but had paid little attention to it, being too absorbed in the things around him. The peoples of Europe, too, had taken it as an accepted thing of life. The stranger continued, “That has been there in the heavens as long as man can remember, but we who know, realize that it is coming closer and closer to the earth. Just when that final rush will come, the rush that shall bring destruction to this world, we do not know, but we fear that the day is not far off. For myself I care not. The day can come anytime and I will be ready. For the sake of the truths we are seeking, however, I hope that that day will never come.” A strange world indeed, mused Carl, when the knowledge of truth dominates and man’s personal ambitions are secondary! Wandering around Carl and Sana saw how complete the destruction had been. The wonderful Palisades of the Hudson had disappeared, the river itself having been turned from its bed many miles away. The East River, too, was gone, having been filled with lava and rock as had a great part of Long Island Sound. While on one of their wonder-filled trips of exploration, they came upon an extinct volcanic crater, very similar in size and appearance to some they had seen on the moon. The air, that day, seemed more oppressive than usual and the heat terrific.