Page:Doughty--Mirrikh or A woman from Mars.djvu/149

 Now we were shown the body of a young man whose face was white and of surprising beauty.

“Saturn is the meaning of that character, friend Wylde,” said the adept, pointing to the gilded criss-cross of lines on this coffin.

“And each contains the body of a man from a different planet in our solar system?”

“Yes, and no. Each contains a body inhabited at some time by a human soul whose dwelling place was on a different planet. These bodies, however, are entirely of this earth.”

“But how are they preserved?”

“You shall soon know. Let us finish our inspection first.”

“I say, look here!” broke in the Doctor, “how many planets do you make? There are coffins enough here to do the business ten times over.”

“You forget the asteroids,” said the adept. “Besides, there is your own and other moons.”

“All inhabited?”

“All inhabited or destined for inhabitants. God creates nothing in vain.”

“This is madness! Driveling idiocy!” Philpot murmured.

No attention was paid to him, however. Our singular inspection went straight on.

Coffin after coffin was opened.

We were shown men from Venus, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune, the asteroids, many moons, and other planets still further distant from the sun than the last named, for which  our astronomers will ever search in vain.

This is according to Mr. Mirrikh, of course. For my part I neither assent or deny. I simply record what happened.

All were in human form. All were perfect men, and though all differed in appearance, the differences were no  greater than those of men on this earth.

One, said to be of our moon, was dwarfish with an enormous head and a great deal of black, shaggy hair. Another, in a box labeled Venus, was just the reverse, being of huge  proportions with a face as black as a Jamaica negro, and  cruel, repulsive features; but there were two from this planet,  the other being a man of ordinary appearance and white.

One thing I observed, namely, that the further removed from the sun the planet, the more refined and intellectual