d I suppose I have killed their mother," thought Lane, as he bent
over and patted the two furry animals. "Poor little things! I must
come back and get them, and take them with me to the ship, if I can
cross the belt of mist. First of all, though, the mountain--I must go
up that as far as I can climb."

So, descending and shouldering his piece, he strode to where the ashes
of his fire lay and then brought his gun down to the present, for there
was a quick, rustling sound to his left, and he caught a glimpse of
glossy, spotted fur, as an animal passed amongst the dense undergrowth.
Then, before he had time to fire, had he felt so disposed, a huge,
lithe, cat-like creature bounded on to the trunk of the tree he had just
left, uttering a strange, purring cry, and disappeared in the orchids
which clustered about the fork.

"Then I did not shoot the mother," thought Lane. "So much the better."

Then, as all was still and no danger to be apprehended there, he
shouldered his gun and strode off towards the more open ground, which he
reached at last, forgetful of everything but the intense desire to try
and ascend the cone-shaped mountain which stood before him, capped with
a dense pall of smoke and steam.

After tramping about an hour, the sight of trickling water down amongst
some stones suggested to him the fact that he had not broken his fast
that morning, so sitting down upon a block of stone, he brought out the
remains left in his wallet and ate them, stale as they were, as he
looked round him, finding that he had climbed to higher ground than he
expected; but though he looked eagerly toward the part where the ship
must have lain in the middle of the wave-swept plain, everything was cut
off by a dull, misty appearance. Not the clearly marked band of sunny
haze he had seen from low down on the level therewith, but a foggy,
indistinct state of the atmosphere.

Away to his right, he feasted his eyes upon the enormous mass of stone
and ash which towered up in a beautifully regular curve, with apparently
nothing to hinder him from walking up the steep slope to the crater,
into which he felt an uncontrollable desire to gaze.

"I ought to get up to the top in two or three hours," he thought, as he
mentally mapped out his course, seeing nothing likely to hinder him but
rough blocks of stone dotted about in all directions. Nothing in
themselves, but ominous of aspect when he took into consideration the
fact that they mus