256 THE UNIVERSE 



ery, and "blue coats with gilt buttons and white 

 neckties with red borders," as evidence of dullness 

 and stagnation. And I cannot believe the news- 

 papers, whose proverbial energy is perennial, will 

 ever get to the low ebb of stagnation he describes. 



But to the more important points. Three thou- 

 sand years before this time messages had been suc- 

 cessfully interchanged with the inhabitants of Mars, 

 and now this message of "a dark star" arrives from 

 Mars, which excites the astronomers, and later the 

 people, until the whole world is in a frenzy of terror, 

 apprehension and despair, watching this terrible 

 star, which continued to increase. 



The people of Mars are also "in a state of ex- 

 traordinary excitement," and our astronomers are 

 much puzzled about the orbit of this dark star, 

 many times the size of our earth. Then the Hima- 

 laya observatory sends out the startling announce- 

 ment that, "the dark star has no orbit; but is 

 falling toward the sun with great speed." 



Then a professor in physics sees the dangerous 

 possibility of its collision with the sun, and has an 

 immense vault, which had been previously built for 

 scientific experiments, a hundred feet under ground, 

 stored with provisions, etc. In this safe retreat he 

 hides himself and his assistants when the dark star 

 strikes the sun, and the fearful conflagration of the 

 sun and earth occurs. And when the sun and earth 

 were burned up by the collision of the dark star 

 with the sun, they, like Noah and his family, were 

 saved from the general destruction. The descrip- 

 tion of the melting of the houses, stones and all 

 combustible material on the surface of the earth, 

 the anguish and despair of the thronging multi- 



