North-West and the North-East. But no man had
any surety; neither could any conceive of the distance from us of that
Refuge.

And counting all this, there was yet the incredible danger and peril of
the Night Land, and the hunger and desolation of the Outer Lands, which
were sometimes named the Unknown Lands.

And I spoke much with Naani concerning this matter of their position;
yet neither she nor her father, the Master Monstruwacan of that Refuge,
had any knowing either of our position; only that the Builder of the
Lesser Redoubt had come out of the Southward World in the Beginning, as
they had knowledge of by the Records.

Also, the father of Naani set that ancient Compass to bear; for, as he
made explanation to us through the Instrument, so great a power of the
Earth-Current must be ours that, perchance it was our force which did
affect the pointer from steadfastness. For, indeed, the needle did swing
in an arc, as we heard, that held between the North and the South;
within the Westward arc; but this it had done ever with them, and so was
a very helpless guide; save that, maybe, as we had thought, the force of
the Earth-Current that was with us, had in truth some power to pull the
needle towards us. And if this were so of verity, we made a reckoning
that set the Lesser Redoubt to the North; and they did likewise, and put
us to the South; yet was it all built upon the sand of guess-work; and
nothing to adventure the life and soul upon.

Now we, of curiosity; though a million times had it been done in the
past ages, set the compass before us, having it from the Great Museum.
But, as ever in that age, it did spin if we but stirred the needle, and
would stop nowheres with surety, for the flow of the Earth-Current from
the "Crack" beneath the Pyramid had a power to affect it away from the
North, and to set it wandering. And this may seem very strange to this
present Age; yet to that, it was most true to the seeming nature of
things; and harder to believe that ever it did once point steadfastly,
to prove a guide of sureness, and unfailing.

For, be it known, we knew the positions of the Land by tradition, coming
from that ancient time when, in the Half-Gloom they had builded the
Pyramid; they having known the use of that ancient compass, and with
sight of the Sun had named the Positions; though we of that far future
day had forgotten the very beginnings of those Names of Direction; and
used them but because our father