first opportunity, which ought to occur within the next few weeks. The case with your manuscript enclosed will be dropped in some lonely place inland, where it may or may not be ultimately discovered, brought to a civilised city, deciphered, studied, discussed and published. For myself, I fail to grasp your evident sense of satisfaction in so trivial and futile a scheme; but it is clear you are obstinately bent on your purpose, and by my recent oath I am bound under the severest spiritual penalties to aid you. Yet who on your Earth will ever be found to believe in your fantastic story? And even if it were held worthy of credence, of what value would it prove to your fellow-men? Or again, what possible tittle of benefit would you gain by stirring up Herthian interest in this account of your adventures in Meleager?" And d'Aragno's face for a moment took on the quizzical yet imperious look I had noted when he was addressing me at length in the parlour of the great London hotel some five years ago. By this time darkness had fallen outside, and this circumstance now urged my host to speed my departure. Quickly leaving the house in the obscurity of the encroaching nightfall, together we crossed the glen with its murmuring brook, and scaled the opposite bank to enter the depths of the enclosing forest. Following a rough path we advanced for some time without exchanging a word, till at last we debouched into a wide open space where we halted. The sharp dewy freshness of the night air was now upon us, whilst the hooting of distant owls and other nocturnal sounds filled our ears, as we stood gazing into the dark blue vault overhead. The stars glistened with the peculiar brilliance associated with a touch of frost, and shining above the tree-tops was a conspicuous planet far surpassing its companion stars in size and lustre. D'Aragno paused, and pointing towards the ascending orb quietly informed me it was the Earth, my old domicile; and somehow this piece of information caused in me an indefinable thrill, so that I could not repress a slight shiver, as I fixed my eyes on my far-away abandoned home. At the same time a curious tale of my childhood leaped, as it were, into my memory, for I began to understand with a greater clarity than ever before the extraordinary nature of the fate that had befallen me.