CHAPTER I 



BEYOND THE STARS 



IN the preceding description of the infra-world I 

 followed a line of reasoning which led to the con- 

 clusion that by descending in order of magnitude 

 far below the smallest microscopic object until we 

 reach the world of atoms, we discover a world which 

 in all probability, is not essentially different from 

 the world we live in, and may possibly be almost 

 identical in most of its astronomical, physical, and 

 chemical conditions with our own visible universe. 

 I endeavoured, by reasoning from the known laws of 

 electricity and chemistry, to ascertain the forces at 

 play in that " infra-world." The most curious and 

 important result so obtained was that events happen 



;uuch faster in the infra- world as the sizes are 

 smaller. The ratio for both is 10 22 :!. Since the 

 velocities of atoms turn out to be of the same order 

 as our " planetary " velocities (about 20 miles per 

 second), there was good reason to assume that all 

 velocities remain about the same, and since the 



> lance of the ether to velocities greater than 

 186,000 miles per second is infinite, it was natural 



