looked at disappeared. It was not condensed enough to be visible to
direct vision, yet he was aware of it from the corner of his eye.
Shapeless and threatening, the gloomy thickness of the air floated
beside him like the vague monster of a dream. Sometimes he fancied that
he saw an arm or a limb among the folds of the cloud, or an approach to
a face; the instant he looked it vanished. Marching at each hand these
vapours bore him horrible company.

His brain became unsteady, and flickering things moved about him; yet,
though alarmed, he was not afraid; his senses were not acute enough for
fear. The heat increased; his hands were intolerably hot as if he had
been in a fever, he panted; but did not perspire. A dry heat like an
oven burned his blood in his veins. His head felt enlarged, and his eyes
seemed alight; he could see these two globes of phosphoric light under
his brows. They seemed to stand out so that he could see them. He
thought his path straight, it was really curved; nor did he know that he
staggered as he walked.

Presently a white object appeared ahead; and on coming to it, he found
it was a wall, white as snow, with some kind of crystal. He touched it,
when the wall fell immediately, with a crushing sound as if pulverised,
and disappeared in a vast cavern at his feet. Beyond this chasm he came
to more walls like those of houses, such as would be left if the roofs
fell in. He carefully avoided touching them, for they seemed as brittle
as glass, and merely a white powder having no consistency at all. As he
advanced these remnants of buildings increased in number, so that he had
to wind in and out round them. In some places the crystallized wall had
fallen of itself, and he could see down into the cavern; for the house
had either been built partly underground, or, which was more probable,
the ground had risen. Whether the walls had been of bricks or stone or
other material he could not tell; they were now like salt.

Soon wearying of winding round these walls, Felix returned and retraced
his steps till he was outside the place, and then went on towards the
left. Not long after, as he still walked in a dream and without feeling
his feet, he descended a slight slope and found the ground change in
colour from black to a dull red. In his dazed state he had taken several
steps into this red before he noticed that it was liquid, unctuous and
slimy, like a thick oil. It deepened rapidly and was already over his
s