oom, and presently the _Astronef_
changed her course, and in a few minutes was hanging with her polished
hull bathed in sunlight, like a star suspended over the unfathomable
gulf of darkness below.

As they sank below the level of the sun-rays, Murgatroyd turned on both
the searchlights. They dropped down ever slowly and more slowly until
gradually the two long, thin streams of light began to spread themselves
out; the lower they went the more the beams spread out, and by the time
the _Astronef_ came gently to a rest they were swinging round her in
broad fans of diffused light over a dark, marshy surface, with scattered
patches of grey moss and reeds, with dull gleams of stagnant water
showing between them.

"Air and water at last! I thought so," said Redgrave, as he rejoined her
on the upper deck; "air and water and eternal darkness! Well, we shall
find life on the moon here if anywhere."

"I suppose we had better put on our breathing-dresses, hadn't we?" asked
Zaidie.

"Certainly," he replied, "because, although there is some sort of air,
we don't know yet whether we shall be able to breathe it. It may be half
carbon-dioxide for all we know; but a few matches will soon tell us
that."

Within a quarter of an hour they were again standing on the surface.
Murgatroyd had orders to follow them as far as possible with the head
searchlight, which, in the comparatively rarefied atmosphere, appeared
to have a range of several miles. Redgrave struck a match, and held it
up level with his head; it burnt with a clear, steady, yellow flame.

"Where a match will burn a man should be able to breathe," he said. "I'm
going to see what lunar air is like."

"For Heaven's sake be careful, dear," came the reply in pleading tones
across the wire.

"All right; but don't open your helmet till I tell you."

He then raised the hermetically closed slide of glass, which formed the
front of the helmets, half an inch or so. Instantly he felt a sensation
like the drawing of a red-hot iron across his skin. He snapped the visor
down and clasped it in its place. For a moment or two he gasped for
breath, and then he said rather faintly:

"It's no good, it's too cold. It would freeze the blood of a salamander.
I think we'd better go back and explore this place under cover. We can't
do anything in the dark, and we can see just as well from the upper deck
with the searchlights. Besides, as there's air and water here, there's
no telling but th