breaking down of matter itself
into the corresponding particles. However, it has been shown that they
are quite similar to protelectricity in their general behavior. Thus,
the power that propels your space-vessel, your attractors, your
repellers, your object-compass, your zone of force--all these things are
simply a few of the many hundreds of wave-bands of the fourth order, all
of which you doubtless would have worked out for yourselves in time.
Very little is known, even in theory, of the rays of the fifth order,
although they have been shown to exist."

"For a man having no knowledge, you seem to know a lot about rays. How
about the fifth order--is that as far as they go?"

"My knowledge is slight and very general; only such as I must have in
order to understand my own subject. The fifth order certainly is not the
end--it is probably scarcely a beginning. We think now that the orders
extend to infinite smallness, just as the galaxies are grouped into
larger aggregations, which are probably in their turn only tiny units in
a scheme infinitely large.

"Over six thousand years ago the last third order rays were worked out;
and certain peculiarities in their behavior led the then Rovol to
suspect the existence of the fourth order. Successive generations of the
Rovol proved their existence, determined the conditions of their
liberation, and found that this metal of power was the only catalyst
able to decompose matter and thus liberate the rays. This metal, which
was called Rovolon after the Rovol, was first described upon theoretical
grounds and later was found, by spectroscopy, in certain stars, notably
in one star only eight light-years away, but not even the most
infinitesimal trace of it exists in our entire solar system. Since these
discoveries, the many Rovol have been perfecting the theory of the
fourth order, beginning that of the fifth, and waiting for your coming.
The present Rovol, like myself and many others whose work is almost at a
standstill, is waiting with all-consuming interest to greet you, as soon
as the _Skylark_ can be landed upon our planet."

"Neither your rocket-ships nor your projections could get you any
Rovolon?"

"No. Every hundred years or so someone develops a new type of rocket
that he thinks may stand a slight chance of making the journey, but not
one of these venturesome youths has as yet returned. Either that sun has
no planets or else the rocket-ships have failed. Our projections a