Page:A thousand years hence. Being personal experiences (IA thousandyearshen00gree).djvu/377

 which attend incautious bathing. Repeatedly young children, taking, perhaps, a refreshing dip towards the evening of a hot day, have been caught by the ice, and been got out with difficulty. In one case lately, in some shallow water, a boy was so caught by the feet, and both limbs considerably injured, as well as frostbitten, ere he could be released.

The Vulcanians are not much given to business. There are no speculations and crises here. The people are much attached to all scientific pursuits, but withal there is not much reasoning power in their heads. They are remarkably harmless, and one can't help liking them. Of course you and they can't come into contact, friendly or otherwise—no handshaking here. While their temperature would roast us, contact with us is not less terrible to them; for a finger, thrust through our panoply, and touching even our dress, would be skinned by the excessive cold, much as our own tongues would be served in touching bodies in extreme cold at our own poles. We and the Vulcanians stand therefore in great mutual awe and respect. We had a hearty joke with young Brown about a pleasant young daughter of the agent he had come to terms with here. What a warm embrace might be in prospect in certain contingencies! and how such a fair partner might stir up the fire of love in more than one sense of the words!

With a considerably reduced company, we now resumed our voyage to the sun; and now every