cific disposition, proper to a man of science, had behaved with
the courage and coolness of a veteran in every crisis; Monsieur Moissan,
the eminent chemist; Professor Sylvanus P. Thompson, and the Heidelberg
professor, to whom we all felt under special obligations because he had
opened to our comprehension the charming lips of Aina--all these had
survived, and were about to return with us to the earth.

It seemed to some of us almost heartless to deprive the Martians who
still remained alive of any of the provisions which they themselves
would require to tide them over the long period which must elapse before
the recession of the flood should enable them to discover the sites of
their ruined homes, and to find the means of sustenance. But necessity
was now our only law. We learned from Aina that there must be stores of
provisions in the neighborhood of the palace, because it was the custom
of the Martians to lay up such stores during the harvest time in each
Martian year in order to provide against the contingency of an
extraordinary drought.

It was not with very good grace that the Martian emperor acceded to our
demands that one of the storehouses should be opened, but resistance was
useless and of course we had our way.

The supplies of water which we brought from the earth, owing to a
peculiar process invented by Monsieur Moissan, had been kept in
exceedingly good condition, but they were now running low and it became
necessary to replenish them also. This was easily done from the Southern
Ocean, for on Mars, since the levelling of the continental elevations,
brought about many years ago, there is comparatively little salinity in
the sea waters.

While these preparations were going on Lord Kelvin and the other men of
science entered with the utmost eagerness upon those studies, the
prosecution of which had been the principal inducement leading them to
embark on the expedition. But, almost all of the face of the planet
being covered with the flood, there was comparatively little that they
could do. Much, however, could be learned with the aid of Aina from the
Martians, now crowded on the land above the palace.

The results of these discoveries will in due time appear, fully
elaborated in learned and authoratative treatises prepared by these
savants' themselves. I shall only call attention to one, which seemed to
me very remarkable. I have already said that there were astonishing
differences in the personal appe