two hours, with the sun already high in the
sky, when they noticed a diminution of light. Glancing up, they saw
that one of the moons was passing across the sun, and that they were on
the eve of a total eclipse.

"Since all but the fifth moon," said Cortlandt, "revolve exactly in the
plane of Jupiter's equator, any inhabitants that settle there will
become accustomed to eclipses, for there must be one of the sun, and
also of the moons, at each revolution, or about forty-five hundred in
every Jovian year. The reason we have seen none before is, because we
are not exactly on the equator."

They had a glimpse of the coronal streamers as the last portion of the
sun was covered, and all the other phenomena that attend an eclipse on
earth. For a few minutes there was a total return to night. The
twinkling stars and other moons shone tranquilly in the sky, and even
the noise of the insects ceased. Presently the edge of the sun that
had been first obscured reappeared, and then Nature went through the
phenomenon of an accelerated dawn. Without awaiting a full return of
light, the travellers proceeded on their way, and had gone something
over a hundred yards when Ayrault, who was marching second, suddenly
grasped Bearwarden, who was in front, and pointed to a jet-black mass
straight ahead, and about thirty yards from a pool of warm water, from
which a cloud of vapour arose. The top of the head was about seven
feet high, and the length of the body exceeded thirty feet. The six
legs looked as strong as steel cables, and were about a foot through,
while a huge, bony proboscis nine feet in length preceded the body.
This was carried horizontally between two and three feet from the
ground. Presently a large ground sloth came to the pool to drink,
lapping up the water at the sides that had partly cooled. In an
instant the black armored monster rushed down the slope with the speed
of a nineteenth-century locomotive, and seemed about as formidable.
The sloth turned in the direction of the sound, and for a moment seemed
paralyzed with fear; it then started to run, but it was too late, for
the next second the enormously exaggerated ant--for such it
was--overtook it. The huge mandible shears that when closed had formed
the proboscis, snapped viciously, taking off the sloth's legs and then
cutting its body to slivers. The execution was finished in a few
seconds, and the ponderous insect carried back about half the sloth to
its