if she does look like a walrus, and that cute little
seal of a baby was just too perfectly cunning for words. That boy Seven
is keen as mustard, too."

"He should be," put in Crane, dryly. "He probably has as much
intelligence now as any one of us."

"Do you think so?" asked Margaret. "He acted like any other boy, but he
did seem to understand things remarkably well."

"He would--they're 'way ahead of us in most things." Seaton glanced at
the two women quizzically and turned to Crane. "And as for their being
bald, this was one time, Mart, when those two phenomenal heads of hair
our two little girl-friends are so proud of didn't make any kind of hit
at all. They probably regard that black thatch of Peg's and Dot's auburn
mop as relics of a barbarous and prehistoric age--about as we would
regard the hirsute hide of a Neanderthal man."

"That may be so, too," Dorothy replied, unconcernedly, "but we aren't
planning on living there, so why worry about it? I like them, anyway,
and I believe that they like us."

"They acted that way. But say, Mart, if that planet is so old that all
their land area has been eroded away, how come they've got so much water
left? And they've got quite an atmosphere, too."

"The air-pressure," said Crane, "while greater than that now obtaining
upon Earth, was probably of the order of magnitude of three meters of
mercury, originally. As to the erosion, they might have had more water
to begin with than our Earth had."

"Yeah, that'd account for it, all right," said Dorothy.

"There's one thing I want to ask you two scientists," Margaret said.
"Everywhere we've gone, except on that one world that Dick thinks is a
wandering planet, we've found the intelligent life quite remarkably like
human beings. How do you account for that?"

"There, Mart, is one for the massive old bean to concentrate on,"
challenged Seaton: then, as Crane considered the question in silence for
some time he went on: "I'll answer it myself, then, by asking another.
Why not? Why shouldn't they be? Remember, man is the highest form of
earthly life--at least, in our own opinion and as far as we know. In our
wanderings, we have picked out planets quite similar to our own in point
of atmosphere and temperature and, within narrow limits, of mass as
well. It stands to reason that under such similarity of conditions,
there would be a certain similarity of results. How about it, Mart?
Reasonable?"

"It seems plausible, in a way,