er almost identical
with the one from which I had escaped; deep and inaccessible, and with
a mass of vegetation filling the bottom.

This discovery gave me food for thought. It had never entered my head
that the queer place of my imprisonment had been one of many, and I had
thought that once I could reach even a friendly native tribe where some
kind of rope was obtainable I could locate the crater again and secure
the bag of diamonds. But I had already stumbled upon another crater,
and maybe there were many? And this indeed I found to be the case, for
they became more numerous as I proceeded, until the whole country was
pitted with them. They were of all sizes and depths, some mere pits of
fifty feet in diameter or less, some huge gulfs a mile or more across,
and so deep that it was difficult to distinguish what was at the
bottom. Invariably their walls were sheer and I could explore none of
them, but in nearly all I saw the gleam of water.

So numerous were they, as I penetrated farther into this strange
country, that I was forced to make wide detours in my endeavor to avoid
them, and so bewildering did this labyrinth of huge pits at last become
that I became hopelessly lost among them, and at times thought that I
should never break clear of them again. Day after day I wandered about
this vast and apparently level plain, finding every short distance a
huge yawning gulf at my feet, forced to try new routes, and constantly
being pulled up by similar obstacles. And all this time I saw no sign
of life, not even a spoor in the sand to show that mankind had ever
trod there. There was no animal life even; a few birds, and a few
snakes, nothing more indeed so deserted and dead was this weird land
that it appeared unreal, and often I imagined that by some strange
chance I had been transported to some other and long-dead planet, so
little was this maze of craters like Mother Earth.

I had food and water enough, and as the moon now gave plenty of light I
walked only at night, resting in the shadow of the rocks by day.

One night I had made better progress than usual, having walked for some
hours without having to deviate from my path, and was beginning to hope
that I had escaped from the labyrinth, when suddenly, at my very feet,
there yawned the usual abyss, but this time so huge that I could scarce
make out the farther cliffs, though the moon was full and it was almost
as light as day. It would mean a long and weary detour,