e table,--warm, fleshly hands that seemed to pulsate with mortal
life."

"What? Do you think, then, that this thing is----"

"I don't know what it is," was the solemn reply; "but please the gods I
will, with your assistance, thoroughly investigate it."

We watched together, smoking many pipes, all night long, by the bedside
of the unearthly being that tossed and panted until it was apparently
wearied out. Then we learned by the low, regular breathing that it
slept.

The next morning the house was all astir. The boarders congregated on
the landing outside my room, and Hammond and myself were lions. We had
to answer a thousand questions as to the state of our extraordinary
prisoner, for as yet not one person in the house except ourselves could
be I induced to set foot in the apartment.

The creature was awake. This was evidenced by the convulsive manner in
which the bedclothes were moved in its efforts to escape. There was
something truly terrible in beholding, as it were, those second-hand
indications of the terrible writhings and agonized struggles for liberty
which themselves were invisible.

Hammond and myself had racked our brains during the long night to
discover some means by which we might realize the shape and general
appearance of the Enigma. As well as we could make out by passing our
hands over the creature's form, its outlines and lineaments were human.
There was a mouth; a round, smooth head without hair; a nose, which,
however, was little elevated above the cheeks; and its hands and feet
felt like those of a boy. At first we thought of placing the being on a
smooth surface and tracing its outlines with chalk, as shoemakers trace
the outline of the foot. This plan was given up as being of no value.
Such an outline would give not the slightest idea of its conformation.

A happy thought struck me. We would take a cast of it in plaster of
Paris. This would give us the solid figure, and satisfy all our wishes.
But how to do it? The movements of the creature would disturb the
setting of the plastic covering, and distort the mold. Another thought.
Why not give it chloroform? It had respiratory organs,--that was evident
by its breathing. Once reduced to a state of insensibility, we could do
with it what we would. Doctor X---- was sent for; and after the worthy
physician had recovered from the first shock of amazement, he proceeded
to administer the chloroform. In three minutes afterward we were enabled
to r