Page:Alerielorvoyaget00lach.djvu/174

152 and, therefore, deceptive, when applied do the things of another world. There were, however, many matters on which you might learn from the people of your sister orb. The main point I learnt there was, that all our three worlds are in many points akin, but that earth is the least happy of the three. With us little evil exists; on Mars, though there may once have been quite as much as on earth, and the Martians quite as wicked as men, yet nearly all great evils have been put down and stamped out by the courage and good sense of the Martian rulers. If we are better than men, the Martians are braver, and so have crushed evil which you have left to fester horribly, and render earth one of the most miserable of the many worlds that roll around the King of Day—our mighty sun.

I saw, on my journey, many wonderful things—great cities; long, straight ranges of hills, and equally straight lines of inlets and sounds of green sea; forests and fields of many forms and of varied vegetations; hundreds of fine rivers, of green waters, and canals without number. The land of Mars is nearlv as extensive as that of earth (the seas being much less), and so there is as much to see of interest on Mars as on your world; indeed, there is more