n with fruit, all in luxuriant
foliage. As I walked on, the scenery became more and more charming; but
I saw no signs of man, nor even of birds, nor beasts. Beautiful
butterflies and other insects were abundant; in a little stream I saw
minnows, and a fish elegantly striped with silver and gold; and as I
followed up the brook, occasionally a frog, startled at my approach,
leaped from the bank and dived into the water with a familiar cry. I
wandered on until I judged it to be nearly noon, and, growing hungry,
ventured to taste a fruit which looked more edible than any I had seen.
To my delight I found it as delicious as a paw-paw. I dined on them
heartily, and, sitting under the shade of the low trees from which I had
gathered them, I fell into a reverie which ended in a sound sleep.

When I awoke it was night. I walked out of the little grove in which I
was sheltered, that I might have a clearer view of the stars. I soon
recognized the constellations with which I had been familiar for years,
though in somewhat new positions. Conspicuous near, the horizon was the
"Milk Dipper" of Sagittarius, and I instantly noticed, with a thrill of
intense surprise, that the planet Mars was missing! When I had first
awakened, and stepped out of the grove, I had only a dim remembrance in
my mind of having rambled in the fields and fallen asleep on the grass;
but this planet missing in the constellation Sagittarius recalled to me
at once my miraculous position on the planet Mars. Here was a
confirmation unexpected and irrefragable of the truth of what Copernicus
had written by my hand. The excited whirl of thoughts and emotions thus
revived banished sleep, and I walked back and forward under the grove,
and out on the open turf, gazing again and again at the constellation in
which, only two days before, I had from the Jersey City ferryboat seen
the now missing planet. At length Sagittarius sank behind the mountains,
and the Twins arose out of the sea. With new wonder and admiration I
beheld in Castor's knee the steady lustre of a planet which I had not
known before,--an overwhelming proof of the reality of my asserted
position on the planet Mars. For as this new planet was exactly in the
opposite pole of the point whence Mars was missing, what could it be but
my native Earth seen as a planet from that planet which had now become
my earth? You may imagine that this new vision excited me too much to
allow sleep to overpower me again until ne