in on either side until they were less
than a hundred yards apart, while the bed of the ravine was blocked
by boulders, great and small, so that the little stream, which was now
diminished to the proportions of a brook, had to come down where and how
it could. The forms of life grew stranger. Pure plants and pure animals
disappeared by degrees, and their place was filled by singular creatures
that seemed to partake of both characters. They had limbs, faces, will,
and intelligence, but they remained for the greater part of their time
rooted in the ground by preference, and they fed only on soil and air.
Maskull saw no sexual organs and failed to understand how the young came
into existence.

Then he witnessed an astonishing sight. A large and fully developed
plant-animal appeared suddenly in front of him, out of empty space. He
could not believe his eyes, but stared at the creature for a long time
in amazement. It went on calmly moving and burrowing before him, as
thought it had been there all its life. Giving up the puzzle, Maskull
resumed his striding from rock to rock up the gorge, and then, quietly
and without warning, the same phenomenon occurred again. No longer could
he doubt than he was seeing miracles--that Nature was precipitating its
shapes into the world without making use of the medium of parentage....
No solution of the problem presented itself.

The brook too had altered in character. A trembling radiance came up
from its green water, like some imprisoned force escaping into the
air. He had not walked in it for some time; now he did so, to test its
quality. He felt new life entering his body, from his feet upward; it
resembled a slowly moving cordial, rather than mere heat. The sensation
was quite new in his experience, yet he knew by instinct what it was.
The energy emitted by the brook was ascending his body neither as friend
nor foe but simply because it happened to be the direct road to its
objective elsewhere. But, although it had no hostile intentions, it was
likely to prove a rough traveller--he was clearly conscious that
its passage through his body threatened to bring about some physical
transformation, unless he could do something to prevent it. Leaping
quickly out of the water, he leaned against a rock, tightened his
muscles, and braced himself against the impending charge. At that very
moment the blurring again attacked his sight, and, while he was guarding
against that, his forehead sprouted