Page:John Uri Lloyd - Etidorhpa.djvu/230

 == THE MANUSCRIPT CONTINUED. ==

A LESSON ON VOLCANOES.—PRIMARY COLORS ARE CAPABLE OF FARTHER SUBDIVISION.
"Get into the boat," said my eyeless pilot, "and we will proceed to the farther edge of the lake, over the barrier of which at great intervals of time, the surface water flows, and induces the convulsion known as Mount Epomeo."

We accordingly embarked, and a gentle touch of the lever enabled us rapidly to skirt the shore of the underground sea. The soft, bright, pleasant earth-light continually enveloped us, and the absence of either excessive heat or cold, rendered existence delightful. The weird forms taken by the objects that successively presented themselves on the shore were a source of continual delight to my mind. The motion of our boat was constantly at the will of my guide. Now we would skim across a great bay, flashing from point to point; again we wound slowly through tortuous channels and among partly submerged stones.

"What a blessing this mode of locomotion would be to humanity," I murmured.

"Humanity will yet attain it," he replied. "Step by step men have stumbled along towards the goal that the light of coining centuries is destined to illuminate. They have studied, and are still engaged in studying, the properties of grosser forces, such as heat and electricity, and they will be led by the thread they are following, to this and other achievements yet unthought of, but which lie back of those more conspicuous."

We finally reached a precipitous bluff, that sprung to my view as by magic, and which, with a glass-like surface, stretched upward to a height beyond the scope of my vision, rising