on the concave walls of the world around us.

"You must come to see both Egyplosis and Arjeels," said her holiness,
"but before you leave Tanje you must see my garden."

"It must be a little paradise!" I exclaimed.

"Let us go and see it now," she said, and, so saying, arose with a
gracious gesture and led me out of the apartment.

I accompanied her holiness down the terrace leading to the lovely
retreat. Curving walks led between banks of flowers of all hues.
There were avenues of tall shrubs not unlike rhododendrons, with the
same magnificent bloom. Other plants, such as the firesweet, displayed
a blinding wealth of yellow flowers.

[Illustration: Jeerloons.]

The goddess led the way to the conservatory in the garden wherein were
treasured strange and beautiful flowers and zoophytes illustrative of
the gradual evolution of animals from plants, a scientific faith that
held sway in Atvatabar. The goddess showed me a beautiful plant with
large fan-shaped leaves from whose edges hung a fringe of heavy roses;
long trailing garlands of clustering star-shaped flowers sprang from
the same roots. The plant was a perfect bower of bliss, and while
called the laburnul, might with greater propriety be styled the rose
of paradise.

[Illustration: A Jeerloon.]

Another fern-like plant was in reality a bird flower, called the
lilasure. It had the head and breast of a bird, from whose back grew
roots and four small feathers resembling those of the peacock. Its
tail resembled two large fronds of a fern, which served the animal for
wings, for by their aid it flew through the air.

There was also a flock of strange green-feathered creatures,
resembling buzzards, called green gazzles, on whose heads grew
sun-flowers. On either side, beneath their wings, were the plant roots
by means of which they still sucked nourishment from the soil, as
their bills were not yet perfectly developed. They belonged to a
locality on the south coast of Atvatabar known as Glockett Gozzle.

The lillipoutum was another wonderful creature, half-plant half-bird.
It represented the animal almost entirely evolved from the plant
stage. A wreath of rootlets adorned the neck, but the most conspicuous
features were the stork-like legs that terminated in roots with
radiations like encrinital stems. The bird fed itself like a plant by
simply thrusting its root-legs into the soft ooze of lake bottoms and
slimy banks of rivers. Its tail was also a root possessi