make various articles of it. They must have a blacksmith shop, and I'm going to find it."
It wasn't long—perhaps two days' time after our arrival—when we came upon the place. It was in one of the side caverns, and we actually found several of the savage smiths at work, with furs fastened over their ears to ward off the sound. They were turning out long, sharp-pointed tools, the purpose of which Edmund divined in a moment.
"They're to dig coal with," he said.
And he was right. The strata of rock were filled with seams of a very hard coal, and these people dug it out to keep their fires going. It was the best coal that I have ever seen, infinitely better even than anthracite.
"But where did they get their fire to begin with?" asked Jack.
"Perhaps' by friction, like our savages on the earth," Edmund replied.
"Perhaps they got it down below," I added.
"What do you mean by that?" asked Jack.
"I know what he means," interposed Edmund, "better than he does himself, perhaps. Venus, there is reason to believe, is not as old a planet as the earth. Consequently its crust is not as thick. It may be that the internal fires do not lie so deep. I shouldn't be surprised if that accounts, in part, for the comfortable temperature down here, when the surface above us is so terribly cold, owing to the absence of the sun."
Our discovery of the smithy seemed to have set Edmund to thinking. After musing a while, he said:
"This is a most fortunate thing for us. We'll have occasion to employ the skill of these fellows, and to teach them something new, for our own benefit."
"How's that?" I asked.
The Strange Sledge Trip Proposed
"It's this way: I want to take some of these fellows along when we start for the daylight ride of the planet. I can find my way well enough with the aid of the stars, but these creatures may be useful to us in other ways. But we can't take them in the car, which is full enough already. Luckily, the power of the car is practically unlimited, and it could draw a whole train, if necessary. Now, I'm going to carry them along in sleds, dragged after the car, and I'll make the sleds of iron, since there’s no wood to be had. It's another lucky thing that this part of Venus is almost a dead level, a sort of rolling prairie, as you have observed, covered with a kind of icy shingle, which is just suited for runners. Trees can't grow here; and if there were ever any rivers, they became frozen solid ages ago."
"But why not make the fellows walk?" asked Jack. "They've got good legs."
"Walk!" said Edmund. "Why, man, we've got at least five thousand miles to go before we reach the edge of the sunlit hemisphere, and I don't propose to spend several months on the way. With the sleds drawn after the car, we can make the journey at the rate of a hundred miles an hour."
"All right," said Jack. "The sooner you start the better, as far as I'm concerned. I want to find the good-looking people of Venus. These don't suit my taste."
Henry, after his manner, said nothing; but as I saw him looking about, I got the impression that he was calculating the millions that might be made out of these iron-mines on Venus. Edmund never reached a decision without starting immediately to put it into practise. He now began his preparations for the journey to the other side. But they were quickly interrupted in a most dramatic fashion.
While we were occupied in the smithy, as I call it, showing the native smiths how to fashion the runners and upper parts of the proposed sleds, we were interrupted by some one coming in and calling our assistants away from us. They all ran out, and we after them. On arriving in the principal cavern, we found a singular scene.
The Earth Seen from Venus
Two natives, whom we did not recognize as having made their appearance before, were evidently in charge of some kind of ceremony. They wore tall, conical caps of polished metal, covered with curious hieroglyphics, and had staves of iron in their hands. They marshaled all the others, numbering several hundreds, into a long column, and then began a slow, solemn march up the steps. The two leaders produced a squeaking music by blowing into the ends of their staves. Women were mingled with men, and even the children were not excluded. We followed at the tail of the procession, our curiosity at the highest pitch.
At the rate we went it must have taken nearly an hour to mount the steps. As we emerged into the open air, the cold struck to our marrow. The natives, covered with fur, didn't seem to mind it, but we ran back to the shelf where he had left our Arctic outfits, and put them on. Then we ascended again and emerged into the night, finding the crowd assembled not far from the entrance to the cavern. The frosty sky was ablaze with stars, and directly overhead shone a huge brilliant planet of amazing beauty, and close beside it a smaller one.
"The earth," said Edmund, pointing upward, "and the moon."
It was indeed our planet and her satellite. I can't describe the feeling that came over me at the sight. But in a moment Edmund interrupted my meditation.
A Ceremonious Procession of the Venustians
"Look at that!" he said.
The natives had formed themselves in a great circle under the starlight, with the two leaders standing in the center. All the others dropped on their knees, and the leaders raised their long arms toward the sky and gazed up at the zenith, at the same time uttering a kind of chant in their queer, subdued voices.
"By Jove, they're worshiping the earth!" exclaimed Edmund.
Indeed, she looked worth worshiping! Never have I seen so amazingly splendid an object. She
