Page:Alerielorvoyaget00lach.djvu/94

72 ocean was drained from them and only the sea-bottom left.

The feeling of loneliness intensified and grew rapidly upon me as the dark shadows of these tremendous peaks in the setting sun, sharply defined in the absence of an atmosphere, gathered around me. The valleys long had been in darkness. Now peak after peak grew black; at last night closed around me, and the bright orb of day sank amid the mountains.

The black sky was now varied by a myriad glittering stars, amid which the great earth rolled with its oceans and continents partly defined through the clouds and mist, with which, in many places, it was enveloped. I looked for England, but I only saw the mist in which it was wrapt. Some parts of the earth, however, came out clearly, especially the regions of the tropics. At either pole, just as you see on Mars, there was a glittering mass of snow and ice shining white in the sunlight.

I looked and wondered, and then I turned to the desolate scene around me, dimly illumined by the earth-light, and then, as I felt my loneliness—alone, alone, in a dead world,—I knelt in awe and worshipped God.