In brief, Lazaroff’s scheme was this: If animal tissues, removed from the entire organism, can exist in a condition of suspended vitality for an indefinite time, at a temperature suited to them in conditions which forbid germ life to flourish, why not the living animal? Lazaroff had selected three monkeys from among our stock for the experiment. They were to be sealed each in a vacuum cylinder of special design, and left for a century. “The more I think about the plan, the more enthusiastic I become, Pennell,” Lazaroff cried. “If the unconscious cell life survives indefinitely, why not the entire organism plus consciousness?” “Much may happen in a hundred years, Lazaroff,” I answered. “True, Pennell. But they will never find the vault. Even now, before it is sealed, it would not be looked for, built as it is into the cellar wall beneath the freezing-plant. It was to this end, you know, that I brought down workmen from London, instead of employing local talent. Well—we shall leave papers. Earthquakes and revolutions may happen overhead, but a hundred years hence, when the papers are opened, a search will be made. Our traveling simians will be found by a very different world, I assure you, Pennell!” He had the light of an enthusiast in his eyes, and his mood aroused my own imagination. “What use is that, Lazaroff?” I cried. “We shall not know the results of our experiment. And what message can monkeys carry to that world concerning ours? If monkeys, why not men?” He looked at me fixedly, smiling ever so little, and I perceived that he had drawn the expression of that thought out of the depths of my own mind by his strong will. Now he nodded in approbation. “Pennell—” he began, with hesitation, “do you want to know why I myself do not—?” He stopped. “I am almost ashamed to tell you what it is that makes me wish to live out my life among my contemporaries,” he continued. “How strong the primal instincts are in all of us, Arnold! Nature, with her blind, but perfectly directed will, warring on mind, and mind rising slowly to dominate her, armed, as she is, with her dreadful arsenal of a thousand superstitions, instincts, terrors. It is a fearful battle, Arnold, and many of us fall by the way.” He turned aside abruptly, as if he regretted the half-confidence. I thought I knew what he meant, and I was stirred too. We dined that night with Sir Spofforth and Esther in their new house within a stone’s throw of the Institute. Esther was the only child; her mother had died during her infancy. We four had been intimates during the whole five years of the Institute’s existence; strangely alone, we four, in the busy Surrey town. The memory of that last night is the most poignant that remains to me. How far away it seems, and how long ago! If I could have known then that our companionship was ended!