in blue obscurity of the ice-foot. It was so narrow we had to
travel sideways for the most part, a fact which brought my face close
against the clear blue glass walls, and enabled me from time to time to
see, far back in those translucent depths, more and more and evermore
frozen Martians waiting in stony silence for their release.

But the fact of facts was that slowly the floor of the cleft trended
upwards, whilst the sky strip appeared to come downwards to meet it. A
mile, perhaps, we growled and squeezed up that wonderful gully; then
with a feeling of incredible joy I felt the clear, outer air smiting
upon me.

In my hurry and delight I put my head into the small of the back of the
puffing old man who blocked the way in front and forced him forward,
until at last--before we expected it--the cleft suddenly ended, and he
and I tumbled headlong over each other on to a glittering, frozen
snowslope; the sky azure overhead, the sunshine warm as a tepid bath,
and a wide prospect of mountain and plain extending all around.

So delightful was the sudden change of circumstances that I became
quite boyish, and seizing the old man in my exuberance by the hands,
dragged him to his feet, and danced him round and round in a circle,
while his ancient hair flapped about his head, his skin cloak waved
from his shoulders like a pair of dusky wings and half-eaten cakes,
dried flesh, glittering jewels, broken diadems, and golden finger-rings
were flung in an arc about us. We capered till fairly out of breath,
and then, slapping him on the back shoulder, I asked whose land all
this was about us.

He replied that it was no one's, all waste from verge to verge.

"What!" was my exclamation. "All ownerless, and with so much treasure
hidden hereabout! Why, I shall annex it to my country, and you and I
will peg out original settlers' claims!" And, still excited by the
mountain air, I whipped out my sword, and in default of a star-spangled
banner to plant on the newly-acquired territory, traced in gigantic
letters on the snow-crust--U.S.A.

"And now," I added, wiping the rime off my blade with the lappet of my
coat, "let us stop capering about here and get to business. You have
promised to put me on the way to your big city."

"Come on then," said the little man, gathering up his property. "This
white hillside leads to nowhere; we must get into the valley first, and
then you shall see your road." And right well that quaint barbari