e say but that
all or most manifestations of the occult were not something like
this. The history of our Earth abounds with superstition.
Ghosts--things unexplained. How can one tell but that all occultism
is merely unknown science? Doubtless it is. I can fancy now that in
the centuries of the past many scientists of this realm of the
Fourth Dimension ventured forth a little way toward our world. And
seeing them, we called them ghosts.

What an intrepid explorer was this Tako! An enterprising scoundrel,
fired with a lust for power. He told us now, chuckling with the
triumph of it, how carefully he had studied our world. Appearing
there, timidly at first, then with his growing knowledge of English,
boldly living in Hamilton.

His fame in his own world, among his fellow rulers, rapidly grew.
The few Earth girls he produced were eagerly seized. The fame of
their beauty spread. The desire, the competition for them became
keen. And Tako gradually conceived his great plan. A hundred or more
of the overlords, each with his hundred retainers, were banded
together for the enterprise under Tako's leadership. An army was
organized; weapons and equipment were assembled.

Earth girls were to be captured in large numbers. The most desirable
of them would go into the harems of the princes. The others would be
given to the workers. The desire for them was growing rapidly,
incited by the talk of the overlords. The common man could have more
than one wife--two, even three perhaps--supported by the princely
master. And Tako was dreaming of a new Empire; increased population;
some of the desert reclaimed; a hundred principalities banded
together into a new nation, with himself as its supreme leader.

* * * * *

And then the attack upon Earth had begun. A few Earth girls were
stolen; then more, until very quickly it was obvious that a wider area
than Bermuda was needed. Tako's mind flung to New York--greatest
center of population within striking distance of him.[3] The foray
into Bermuda--the materialization of that little band on the Paget
hilltop was more in the nature of an experiment than a real attack.
Tako learned a great deal of the nature of this coming warfare, or
thought he did.

[3] The extent of the Fourth Dimensional world was never
made wholly clear to us. Its rugged surface was coincident
with the surface of our earth at Bermuda, at New York City,
and at many points alon