n it all your relations and your
friends, you would feel that, however uncertain your destination might
still remain, you would at least have one common and simultaneous
experience which would hold you to the end in the same close communion.
A lonely death may be terrible, but a universal one, as painless as this
would appear to be, is not, in my judgment, a matter for apprehension.
Indeed, I could sympathize with the person who took the view that the
horror lay in the idea of surviving when all that is learned, famous, and
exalted had passed away."

"What, then, do you propose to do?" asked Summerlee, who had for once
nodded his assent to the reasoning of his brother scientist.

"To take our lunch," said Challenger as the boom of a gong sounded
through the house. "We have a cook whose omelettes are only excelled by
her cutlets. We can but trust that no cosmic disturbance has dulled her
excellent abilities. My Scharzberger of '96 must also be rescued, so far
as our earnest and united efforts can do it, from what would be a
deplorable waste of a great vintage." He levered his great bulk off the
desk, upon which he had sat while he announced the doom of the planet.
"Come," said he. "If there is little time left, there is the more need
that we should spend it in sober and reasonable enjoyment."

And, indeed, it proved to be a very merry meal. It is true that we could
not forget our awful situation. The full solemnity of the event loomed
ever at the back of our minds and tempered our thoughts. But surely it
is the soul which has never faced death which shies strongly from it at
the end. To each of us men it had, for one great epoch in our lives,
been a familiar presence. As to the lady, she leaned upon the strong
guidance of her mighty husband and was well content to go whither his
path might lead. The future was our fate. The present was our own. We
passed it in goodly comradeship and gentle merriment. Our minds were, as
I have said, singularly lucid. Even I struck sparks at times. As to
Challenger, he was wonderful! Never have I so realized the elemental
greatness of the man, the sweep and power of his understanding.
Summerlee drew him on with his chorus of subacid criticism, while Lord
John and I laughed at the contest and the lady, her hand upon his sleeve,
controlled the bellowings of the philosopher. Life, death, fate, the
destiny of man--these were the stupendous subjects of that memorable
hour, m