John Munro

“ We walked in that direction.
"You may return to the earth," said I; "but on the way you must drop me at Venus."
Gazen had no opportunity of answering, for just at that moment we were startled by a piercing shriek from behind the crags, and rushing, or rather bounding forward, saw a sight that made our very blood run cold.
A flying monster, with enormous bat-like wings and hanging legs, was evidently swooping down on Miss Carmichael, as she stood beside her easel on the brow of the cliff.
"Run for your life!" roared Gazen, dashing towards her with frantic speed. ”

“ I need hardly say that none of us viewed the majestic approach of this new world, suspended in the ether, and visibly turning round its axis, without emotion. The boundary of day and night was fairly well marked, and I pictured to myself the wave of living creatures rising from their sleep to life and activity on one side, and going to sleep again on the other, as it crept slowly over the surface. To compare small things with great, the denizens of a planet reminded me of performers under the limelight of a darkened theatre:
"All the world's a stage!" ”

“ My first thoughts were of Alumion, the consecration of our loves, and my resolution to abide in Venus. In getting up I felt so light and buoyant that for a moment I fancied I must be giddy, but on reflection I ascribed the sensation to the intoxication of passion, and the exhilarating atmosphere of the planet. I looked out of a window towards the blessed island of my dreams, and to my blank amazement found that it was gone! I could neither see anything of the lake, the square, nor the town, but only a bare and rugged platform of weathered rocks, and the cloudy sky above it. ”

“ Because we say it has the infinite and ever-changing beauty of the soul. It is an emblem of Love, and its manifestations--beauty, genius, holiness. In particular it signifies the birth or awakening of love in the human soul. As the plant may be said to exist for the flower, its chief glory, so the man attains his perfection through love, which confers a boundless and immortal worth upon his life. As the root takes from the soil and the flower brings forth the fruit, so hate feeds upon the ill, and love dies for the good of others. ”

“ Gazen and Carmichael had made a journey to the extreme verge of the country; to the very summit of the precipice which surrounded the Crater Land.
Picking my steps over the rough rocks like one who treads on air, I hastened to the brink of the platform. If the car were on the further side of the summit I should be able to see the wide ocean, but if, as I fondly hoped, it were on the hither side, I should enjoy a far-off glimpse of the city and its holy island, which had become a heaven to me. ”

“ A deep and continuous roar, a sound like that of the ocean ascended from the toiling millions below.
"Isn't it awful!" exclaimed Miss Carmichael, in a tone of reverence. "What a city! I seem to understand how an angel feels when he regards the world in space, or a God when He listens to the prayers of humanity."
"For my part," said Gazen, "I feel as though I were standing on my head." ”

“ The voyage out is like a holiday excursion, for it is only the laying that is arduous, and even that is lightened by excitement. Glimpses are got of hide-away spots, where the cable is landed, perhaps. on the verge of the primeval forest or near the port of a modern city, or by the site of some ruined monument of the past. The very magic of the craft and its benefit to the world are a source of pleasure to the engineer, who is generally made much of in the distant parts he has come to join. ”

“ It seemed to me now, a place where the loveliest things never come to birth, or die the soonest--where life itself hangs on a blind mischance, where true friendship is afraid to show its face, where pure love is unrequited or betrayed, and the noblest benefactors of their fellowmen have been reviled or done to death--a place which we regard as a heaven when we enter it, and a hell before we leave it. . . . No, I was not sorry to quit the earth.
And the beautiful planet, shining there so peacefully in the west, was it any better? ”

“ Certainly Venus was a charming place, but I for one am jolly glad to get home again."
Yes, I must confess that I too felt a deep and tranquil pleasure in returning to the familiar scenes and the beloved soil of my infancy.
"You don't seem to care much for Venus," said Miss Carmichael to Gazen. "Probably if you had been born there you would have liked it better."
"That may be. If you would like a place, it is well to be born in it."
"Perhaps if you are a good boy you will go to Venus when you die." ”

“ With such a woman as Alumion a lover does not stop to 'consider the matter,' unless he is a fool."
"A woman--yes; but remember that she is a woman of another planet. She might not make a suitable wife for you."
"I love her. I love her as I can never love a woman of our world. She is a thousand times more beautiful and good than any woman I have ever known. She is an ideal woman--a perfect woman--an angel in human form." ”

“ Most of the highest peaks and ridges, as well as the deepest valleys and ravines, were covered with the embowering forest; but here and there a huge boss of granite or porphyry reared its bare scalp out of the verdure like the head and shoulders of some antediluvian monster. The gigantic palms and foliage trees, all tufted with air-plants or strangled with climbers, were literally buried in flowers of every hue, and the crown of the forest rolled under us like a sea of blossoms. Every moment one enchanting prospect after another opened to our wondering eyes. ”

“ The phonograph lay under the very eyes of Science, and yet she did not see it. The logograph had traced all the curves of speech with ink on paper; and it only remained to impress them on a solid surface in such a manner as to regulate the vibrations of an artificial tympanum or drum. Yet no professor of acoustics thought of this, and it was left to Edison, a telegraphic inventor, to show them what was lying at their feet.
Mere knowledge, uncombined in the imagination, does not bear fruit in new inventions. It is from the union of different facts that a new idea springs. ”

“ For a man of his temperament science is always holding out new problems to solve and fresh promises of triumph. All he did only revealed more work to be done; and many a scheme lies buried in his grave.
Though Siemens was a man of varied powers, and occasionally gave himself to pure speculation in matters of science, his mind was essentially practical; and it was rather as an engineer than a discoverer that he was great. Inventions are associated with his name, not laws or new phenomena. Standing on the borderland between pure and applied science, his sympathies were yet with the latter ”

“ To the poet, nature is a living mystery. He does not seek to know what it is, or how it works. He allows it as a whole to impress itself on his entire soul, like the reflection in a mirror, and is content with the illusion, the effect. By its power and beauty it awakens ideas and sentiments within him. He does not even consider the part which his own mind plays, and as his fancy is quite free, he tends to personify inanimate things, as the ancients did the sun and moon.
To the man of science, on the other hand, nature is a molecular mechanism. ”

“ At a like distance the earth would seem still fairer, and perhaps even now some wretch in Venus is asking himself a similar question. Is it not probable that just as all the worlds are made of the same materials, so the mixture of good and evil is much the same in all? I turned to the stars, where in all ages man has sought an answer to his riddles. The better land! Where is it? if not among the stars. I am now in the old heaven above the clouds. Does it lie within the visible universe, as it lies within the heart when peace and happiness are there? ”

“ In the light of a new discovery, we are apt to wonder why our fathers were so blind as not to see it. When a new invention has been made, we ask ourselves, Why was it not thought of before? The discovery seems obvious, and the invention simple, after we know them. ”

“ It also represents the human race, for man, and especially woman, may be regarded as the flower of this lower world. Moreover, the entire plant, root, stem, and flower, is symbolical of all creation, and some of our poets have named it the 'Lily of Life.' For as the plant begins in the black earth to end in the sunny ether, so the world, the universe, begins in chaos and darkness, to end in light and order; begins in matter and force, to end in life and spirit—begins in hate and selfishness, to end in love and self-sacrifice—begins in ugliness, to end in beauty. ”

“ I know what I am doing as well as you do. I am not a fool. I am only seeking my own happiness--and hers--I tell you that a single moment in her society is worth a whole lifetime on the earth. What do I say? A lifetime? An eternity. Heaven itself were nothing to me without her. I would not take it as a gift. I shall go back. I must go back. I cannot live without her."
"Take time to consider at all events," said Gazen, somewhat impressed by my vehemence. "In the meantime let us join Miss Carmichael. She is beyond the rocks there sketching the valley." ”

“ Because one inventor at last succeeds in putting the telegraph in operation, are we to neglect his predecessors, whose attempts and failures were the steps by which he mounted to success? All who have extended our knowledge of electricity, or devised a telegraph, and familiarised the public mind with the advantages of it, are deserving of our praise and gratitude, as well as he who has entered into their labours, and by genius and perseverance won the honours of being the first to introduce it. ”

“ I will show it to you."
"Oh, how lovely!" exclaimed Miss Carmichael, looking through the glass. "The bigger star is a golden or topaz yellow, and the smaller a light sapphire blue."
"Some of the star groups and nebulæ are just as pretty," observed Gazen, turning his telescope to another part of the heavens; "most of the stars are white, but there is a sprinkling of yellow, blue, and red amongst them--I mean, of course, to our view, for the absorption of our atmosphere alters the tint."
"Does that mean that there is more youth than age, more life than death, in the universe?" ”

“ Far beneath us an ideal world of clouds hid the surface from our view. We seemed to be floating above a range of snowy Alps, their dusky valleys filled with glaciers, and their sovereign peaks glittering in the sun like diamonds. As we descended in a long slant, their dazzling summits rose to meet us, and the infinite play of light and shade became more and more beautiful. The gliding car threw a distinct shadow which travelled along the white screen, and equally to our surprise and delight became fringed with coloured circles resembling rainbows. ”

“ His first microphones were formed of bits of carbon and scraps of metal, mounted on slips of match-boxes by means of sealing-wax; and the resonance pipes on which they were placed to reinforce the effect of minute sounds, were nothing more than children's toy money boxes, price one halfpenny, having one of the ends knocked out. With such childish and worthless materials he has conquered Nature in her strongholds, and shown how great discoveries can be made. The microphone is a striking illustration of the truth that in science any phenomenon whatever may be rendered useful. ”

“ The big sun was peeping over the distant wall of the crater, but we did not feel his rays uncomfortably hot. A sky of the loveliest azure was streaked with thin white clouds, drawn across it like muslin curtains, and a cooling breeze played gently upon the skin. The dewy air, so spring-like, fresh and sweet, was a positive pleasure to breathe, and we both felt the intoxication, the rapture of life, as we had never felt it since our boyhood. The grass underfoot was green as emerald, and soft as velvet ”

“ Edison, for example, has a large following, who not only work out his ideas, but suggest, improve, and invent of themselves. The master in such a case is able to avail himself of their abilities and magnify his own genius, so to speak. He is not one mind, but the chief of many minds, and absorbs into himself the glory and the work of a hundred willing subjects.
Professor Hughes is not one of these. His fame is entirely self-earned. All that he has accomplished, and he has done great things, has been the labour of his own hand and brain. He is an artist in invention ”

“ By an illusion familiar in the case of railway trains, it seemed to us that the car was stationary, and the planet rushing towards us. On it came like a great shield of silver and ebony, eclipsing the stars and growing vaster every moment. Under the driving force of the engines and the gravity of the planet, our car was falling obliquely towards the orbit, like a small boat trying to cross the bows of an ironclad, and a collision seemed inevitable. ”

“ With his livelihood to earn by his brush, and his invention to work out, Morse was now fully occupied. His diet was simple; he denied himself the pleasures of society, and employed his leisure in making models of his types. The studio was an image of his mind at this epoch. Rejected pictures looked down upon his clumsy apparatus, type-moulds lay among plaster-casts, the paint-pot jostled the galvanic battery, and the easel shared his attention with the lathe. By degrees the telegraph allured him from the canvas, and he only painted enough to keep the wolf from the door. ”

“ All day the serene and beamy azure of the heavens had been plumed with snowy cloudlets of graceful and capricious form, which, as the sun sank to the horizon, were tinged with fleeting glows resembling the iris of a dove's neck, or the hues of a dying dolphin. The great luminary himself was lost in a golden glamour, and a single bright star shone palely through a rosy mist, which covered all the southern sky, like a diamond seen through a bridal veil of gauze. ”

“ Partly owing to the genial climate, their love of beauty, and their easy existence, their dress is of a simple and graceful order. Many of their light robes and shining veils are woven from silky fibres which grow on the trees, and tinged with beautiful dyes. Bright, witty, and ingenious, as well as guileless, chaste, and happy, I can only compare them to grown-up children—but the children of a god-like race. ”

“ How many run to and fro upon the earth, hunting for sights at great trouble and expense, but how few even think of that sublimer scenery of the sky which can be seen without stirring far from home! A peep at some distant orb has power to raise and purify our thoughts like a strain of sacred music, or a noble picture, or a passage from the grander poets. It always does one good."
Professor Gazen silently turned the great refracting telescope in the direction of Mars, and peered attentively through its mighty tube for several minutes. ”

“ Think, too, of the innumerable worlds amongst the stars, and the eternity of the past and future. Whether we look into the depths of space beyond the reach of telescope and microscope, or backward and forward along the vistas of time, we shall find ourselves surrounded with an impenetrable mystery in which the imagination is free to rove.
Science, far from destroying, will foster and develop poetry. It is the part of the scientific to serve the poetical spirit by providing it with fresh matter. ”

“ I left them together, and ascended to the observatory, where Gazen soon afterwards rejoined me.
"I'm the happiest man alive," said he, with a beaming countenance. "Congratulate me. I'm betrothed to Miss Carmichael."
I took his proffered hand, scarcely knowing whether to laugh or cry.
"It seems to me that I have found my life in losing it," he continued with a grim smile. "Saturn! what a courtship is ours—what an engagement—what a bridal bed! But there, old fellow, I'm afraid I'm happier than you—alone in spirit, and separated from her you love. ”

“ There are minds which can foresee what lies before us, and the march of science brings it within our reach. All or nearly all our great scientific victories have been foretold, and they have generally been achieved by more than one person when the time came. The telescope was a dream for ages, so was the telephone, steam and electric locomotion, aerial navigation. Why should we scout the dream of visiting other worlds, which is at least as old as Lucian? Ere long, and perhaps before the century is out, we shall be flying through the air to the various countries of the globe. ”

“ Even if I had never met Alumion I think I should come back and stay on Venus."
"It is certainly a better world, as far as we have seen, but remember your own words, 'Man was made for the earth.' Don't you think this eternal summer—these Elysian Fields—would pall upon you in course of time? Constant bliss, like everlasting honey, might cloy your earthly palate, and make you sigh for our poor, old, wicked, miserable world, that in spite of all its faults and crimes, is yet so interesting, so variable, so dramatic—so dear." ”

“ Regaling our eyes on the beautiful prospect, and our lungs on the pure atmosphere, we wandered along the beach, ever and anon pausing to admire the strange forms and beautiful colouring of the shells and seaweeds, or to pick up a rare pebble, then shie it away again, little thinking that it might have been a ruby, sapphire, or topaz, worth a king's ransom on the earth. ”

“ In these days it is better not to be too sceptical as to what science will accomplish. It is, in fact, wise to keep the mind open and suspend the judgment. We are standing on the threshold of the Arcana, and at any hour the search-light of our intellect may penetrate the darkness, and reveal to our wondering gaze the depths of the inner mechanism of Nature. ”