to invoke the help of the only member of
the family who should, and perhaps would, be willing to run personal
risk for the sake of aiding Eunane in need and protecting Eveena. I
had seen as yet very little of Velna, Eunane's school companion; but
now, calling her apart, I told her frankly that I feared some illness
of my own Earth had by some means been communicated to her friend.

"You have here," I said, "for ages had no such diseases as those which
we on Earth most dread; those which, communicated through water, air,
or solid particles, spread from one person to another, endangering
especially those who come nearest to the sufferers. Whoever approaches
Eunane risks all that I fear for her, and that 'all' means very
probably speedy death. To leave her alone is impossible; and if I
cannot report that she is fully cared for in other hands, no command,
nothing short of actual compulsion, will keep Eveena away from her."

The girl looked up with a steady frank courage and unaffected
readiness I had not expected.

"I owe you much, Clasfempta, and still more perhaps to Eveena. My life
is not so precious that I should not be ready to give it at need for
either of you; and if I should lose Eunane, I would prefer not to live
to remember my loss."

The last words reminded me that to her who spoke death meant
annihilation; a fact which has deprived the men of her race of nearly
every vestige of the calm courage now displayed by this young girl,
indebted as little as any human being could be to the insensible
influences of home affection, or the direct moral teaching which is
sometimes supposed to be a sufficient substitute. I led her at once
into her friend's chamber, and a single glance satisfied me that my
apprehensions were but too well-founded. Remaining long enough to
assure the sufferer that the displeasure I had affected had wholly
passed away, and to suggest the only measures of relief rather than of
remedy that occurred to me, I endeavoured for a few moments to collect
my thoughts and recover the control of my nerves in solitude. In my
own chamber Eveena would assuredly have sought me, and I chose
therefore one of those as yet unoccupied. It did not take long to
convince me that no ordinary resources at my command, no medical
experience of my own, no professional science existing among a race
who probably never knew the disease in question, and had not for ages
known anything like it, could avail me. My later studie