Page:The Poison Belt - Conan Doyle, 1913.djvu/130

 Rh  will steam on and on, until the furnaces die down, or until they run full tilt upon some beach. The sailing ships, too—how they will back and fill with their cargoes of dead sailors, while their timbers rot and their joints leak, till one by one they sink below the surface. Perhaps a century hence the Atlantic may still be dotted with the old drifting derelicts." "And the folk in the coal-mines," said Summerlee, with a dismal chuckle. "If ever geologists should by any chance live upon earth again they will have some strange theories of the existence of man in carboniferous strata."

"I don't profess to know about such things," remarked Lord John, "but it seems to me the earth will be 'To let, empty,' after this. When once our human crowd is wiped off it, how will it ever get on again?"

"The world was empty before," Challenger answered, gravely. "Under laws which in their inception are beyond and