st to have been a series of facts. My theory may seem to
be wildly improbable, but at least no one can venture to say that it is
impossible.

My view is--and it was formed, as is shown by my diary, before my
personal adventure--that in this part of England there is a vast
subterranean lake or sea, which is fed by the great number of streams
which pass down through the limestone. Where there is a large
collection of water there must also be some evaporation, mists or rain,
and a possibility of vegetation. This in turn suggests that there may
be animal life, arising, as the vegetable life would also do, from
those seeds and types which had been introduced at an early period of
the world's history, when communication with the outer air was more
easy. This place had then developed a fauna and flora of its own,
including such monsters as the one which I had seen, which may well
have been the old cave-bear, enormously enlarged and modified by its
new environment. For countless aeons the internal and the external
creation had kept apart, growing steadily away from each other. Then
there had come some rift in the depths of the mountain which had
enabled one creature to wander up and, by means of the Roman tunnel, to
reach the open air. Like all subterranean life, it had lost the power
of sight, but this had no doubt been compensated for by nature in other
directions. Certainly it had some means of finding its way about, and
of hunting down the sheep upon the hillside. As to its choice of dark
nights, it is part of my theory that light was painful to those great
white eyeballs, and that it was only a pitch-black world which it could
tolerate. Perhaps, indeed, it was the glare of my lantern which saved
my life at that awful moment when we were face to face. So I read the
riddle. I leave these facts behind me, and if you can explain them, do
so; or if you choose to doubt them, do so. Neither your belief nor
your incredulity can alter them, nor affect one whose task is nearly
over.

So ended the strange narrative of Dr. James Hardcastle.

The Brazilian Cat

It is hard luck on a young fellow to have expensive tastes, great
expectations, aristocratic connections, but no actual money in his
pocket, and no profession by which he may earn any. The fact was that
my father, a good, sanguine, easy-going man, had such confidence in the
wealth and benevolence of his bachelor elder brother, Lord Southerton,
that he too