IT was long before our strange guest could be induced to continue his narrative. He had seemed to hesitate as he approached the close of his sojourn in the outer islets of the archipelago. He several times postponed the story of his exit from it in the projectile. And for months he left his history hanging in air, and the strange coffin in which he had been confined executing its parabola from his yacht.
There was some excuse for his delay, for the winter had fled, and the birds and the flowering trees around us gloried again in song and colour. He grew restless as the days lengthened, and could not bear to settle in our shelter by the fiord. All that we saw of him for months was his occasional flight from precipice to precipice above the sombre green of the bush. It was as easy for him to flit from knoll to knoll as it was for us to leap a ditch. He had regained his old bird-like gait, that to us was noiseless. What he fed on came to be a puzzle, for he seldom joined us now in our meals; and the old semi-transparency came into his face.
Weeks and weeks together none of us would see him. Where he went we knew not, nor had we the heart to follow him and trace his whereabouts. Now and again he would join one or another of us at our work, and indicate the direction in which we should tunnel or dig for the richer layers of wash-dirt. His instinctive sense of the presence of gold beneath the surface of the earth seemed to us in our blind groping miraculous. We never found him mistaken in his indications. But we felt it a kind of desecration to ask him to condescend to such base and trivial pursuits as the research for wealth. At times his absence was so prolonged that we thought he had vanished back to the ring of mist, whence he had come. But a great storm always brought him to our huts again.
The summer waned into autumn, and the days began to narrow down. Blasts from the south grew keener; and his flight from us was more circumscribed. We saw him almost daily. When the winter nights began, he gave himself up again to memory. He drew towards us in sympathy, and there were in his narrative fewer and fewer reserves. His English became fuller and more exact, though time and again he stumbled over thoughts too subtle to transfuse into so rough and materialistic a language. Our own interpretations of his descriptions must often have been mistaken, we are certain, and many passages we have had to omit because of manifest ambiguity or mistiness of expression.
GODFREY SWEVEN.
PREFACE iii
GLOSSARY vii
I.--MY AWAKENING 1
II.--MY EDUCATION 15
III.--SLEEP, REST, AND FLIGHT 25
IV.--HERMITRY 35
V.--JOURNEY TO THE VALLEY OF MEMORIES 51
VI.--FIALUME 63
VII.--LEOMARIE 88
VIII.--RIMLA 99
IX.--OOMALEFA 112
X.--THE FIRLA, OR ELECTRIC SENSE 133
XI.--A CATASTROPHE 149
XII.--OOLOREFA 162
XIII.--THE LILARAN 174
XIV.--CHOKTROO 192
XV.--THE DUOMOVAMOLAN OR COSMOPHONE 219
XVI.--THEIR HEAVEN AND THEIR HELL 230
XVII.--MY EDUCATION CONTINUED 244
POSTSCRIPT 283
BOOK II 287
GLOSSARY
AILOMO--The astrobiological families.
AIROLAN--A sensometer, or instrument for finding the personal equation of a man.
ALCLIROLAN--Radiographic cinematograph; an instrument combining microscope, camera in vacuo, and electric power.
ALFARENE--Oxygen shrub.
AMMERLIN--Historoscope.
CIRALAISON--Museum of terrors.
CLEVAMOLAN--Combination of telescope and makrakoust, or distance-hearer.
CLIMOLAN--Earth-sensor.
CLIROLAN--Instrument that combines electro-microscopy and photography.
CLIROLANIC--Infinitesimally microscopic.
CORFALEENA--Vacuum-engine car.
DOOMALONA--The hill of farewells.
DUOMOVAMOLAN--Instrument that interprets the music of the cosmos.
ERFALEENA--Anti-gravitation flight-car.
FALEENA--Ship of the air.
FARFALEENA--Electric faleena.
FAROSAN--Aroma-recorder.
FIALUME--The valley of memories.
FILAMMU--The will-telegraph.
FIRLA--The electric sense.
FIRLALAIN--The firlamaic department of Oomalefa.
FIRLAMAI--The arts of the electric sense.
FIRLAMAIC--Belonging to the arts of the firla.
FIRLAMAN--A musical instrument that appeals to the firla.
FLORAMO--The botanical families.
FLORONAL--The tree of life.
FRALOOMIAMO--The families of pioneers that imagine and represent the distant future.
GERMABELL--A tree with fruit that makes the muscles and cartilage more elastic.
IDLUMIAN--Electric steriliser.
IDROLAN--Observer and magnifier of electric impulses.
IDROLINASAN--Machine-reporter of the thoughts and feelings and words of an assembly.
IDROSAN--Recorder of electric impulses and sensations.
IDROVAMOLAN--Instrument for at once seeing and hearing at great distances.
ILARIME--Edifice devoted to the arts of smell, taste, and sound combined.
IMANORA--Centennial review of the civilisation and its progress.
IMATARAN--The focusser of history.
INAMAR--Instrument for splitting up light into its constituents.
INASAN--Recorder of luminous impressions.
INOLAN--Measurer of light.
IRELIUM--Iridescent metal applicable to all manner of purposes by the Limanorans.
LABRAMOR--Alloy of irelium that sponges up and retains electricity.
LABROLAN--Instrument for drawing electricity from the air and the clouds.
LAVIDROLAN--Camera-telescope.
LAVOLAN--Revealer of the inner tissues and mechanism.
LEOMARIE--The science and art of earth-seeing.
LEOMO--The families of earth-seers.
LEOMORAN--The earth-perforator.
LENTA--The minutest division of time in Limanora.
LILAMO--The families that watch the security of the island.
LILARAN--The storm-cone.
LILARIE--The science and art of island-security.
LINAMAR--The analyst of sounds.
LINASAN--Recorder and reproducer of sounds.
LINOKLAR--Spectroscopic analyst and recorder of vapours.
LOOMIAMO--Families of pioneers who imagine and represent the links that connect the present with the distant future.
LOOMIEFA--The theatre of futurition.
MANORA--Decennial review of the progress made by the people.
MARGOL--Electric instrument for blending or reducing the strength of perfumes, flavours, and sounds.
MINELLA--Edifice for formula-machines.
MIRLAN--Life-lamp for revealing and recording internal processes for the use of the eye, the ear, and the electric sense.
MOLTA--The Limanoran measure of infinitesimal length.
MONALAN--Electrical distance-analyst.
MORNALAN--Time-telescope.
NAROLLA--Dream-stimulants.
OOARAN--Psychometer.
OOAROMO--Psycho-physiological families.
OOLORAN--The sonarchitect.
OOLOREFA--The hall of sonarchitecture.
OOMALEFA--Halls of nutrition and medication.
OOROLAN--Instrument for transforming form and colour into melody.
PIRAKNO--Machine for drawing electricity from space.
PIRAMO--The meteorological families.
RIMLA--The centre of force.
SALOSAN--The gustagraph.
SARIFOLAN--Instrument that interprets for sight, hearing, and the electric sense the graphic records of the mirlan.
SARMOLAN--Cosmic barometer.
SIDRALAN--Biometer.
SIDRALMO--Bio-chemical families.
SIDRAMO--The chemical families.
TERRALONA--The edifice of outlook into heaven and hell.
THINAMAR--Visualiser of sound.
TIRLEOMORAN--Electric earth-perforator.
TREMOLAN--Electric clock indicating the changes of electricity in various parts of the island.
TREVAMOLAN--Graduated modifier of sound.
VAMOLAN--Makro-mikrakoust.
VIMOLAN--Photo-electric analyser.
ERRATA
Page 31, line 6. For “resistent” read “resistant.”
Page 93, line 16. For “maintained” read “maimed.”
Page 155, line 2. For “I that felt” read “I had felt.”
Page 211, lines 13 and 17. For “somnifractive” read
“somnifactive.”
Page 230, line 3. For “onwonted” read “unwonted.”
Page 348, last line. For “rareity” read “rarity.”
Page 369, line 12. For “amosphere” read “atmosphere.”
Page 377, line 5. For “its” read “it.”
Page 440, line 17. For “we the saw” read “we saw the.”
Page 465, line 8 from bottom. For “thought” read
“through.”
