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Title: The Second Deluge

Author: Garrett P. Serviss

Release Date: October, 2005  [EBook #9194]
[This file was first posted on September 14, 2003]

Edition: 10

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK, THE SECOND DELUGE ***




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THE SECOND DELUGE

By

Garrett P. Serviss

1912







[Illustration: "THEY MEANT TO CARRY THE ARK WITH A RUSH" [Page 106] ]



FOREWORD


What is here set down is the fruit of long and careful research among
disjointed records left by survivors of the terrible events described.
The writer wishes frankly to say that, in some instances, he has
followed the course which all historians are compelled to take by using
his imagination to round out the picture. But he is able conscientiously
to declare that in the substance of his narrative, as well as in every
detail which is specifically described, he has followed faithfully the
accounts of eyewitnesses, or of those who were in a position to know the
truth of what they related.




CONTENTS


CHAPTER

    I. COSMO VERSÁL

   II. MOCKING AT FATE

  III. THE FIRST DROPS OF THE DELUGE

   IV. THE WORLD SWEPT WITH TERROR

    V. THE THIRD SIGN

   VI. SELECTING THE FLOWER OF MANKIND

  VII. THE WATERS BEGIN TO RISE

 VIII. STORMING THE ARK

   IX. THE COMPANY OF THE REPRIEVED

    X. THE LAST DAY OF NEW YORK

   XI. "A BILLION FOR A SHARE"

  XII. THE SUBMERGENCE OF THE OLD WORLD

 XIII. STRANGE FREAKS OF THE NEBULA

  XIV. THE ESCAPE OF THE PRESIDENT

   XV. PROFESSOR PLUDDER'S DEVICE

  XVI. MUTINY IN THE ARK

 XVII. THE _JULES VERNE_

XVIII. NAVIGATING OVER DROWNED EUROPE

  XIX. TO PARIS UNDER THE SEA

   XX. THE ADVENTURES IN COLORADO

  XXI. "THE FATHER OF HORROR"

 XXII. THE TERRIBLE NUCLEUS ARRIVES

XXIII. ROBBING THE CROWN OF THE WORLD

 XXIV. THE FRENCHMAN'S NEW SCHEME

  XXV. NEW YORK IN HER OCEAN TOMB

 XXVI. NEW AMERICA




ILLUSTRATIONS


"THEY MEANT TO CARRY THE ARK WITH A RUSH"

"THE GREAT BATTLESHIP ... CRASHED, PROW ON, INTO THE STEEL-RIBBED WALLS"

"IT IS A PROPHECY OF THE SECOND DELUGE"

"AND THEN THEY FLOATED NEAR THE MONUMENTAL TOMB OF GENERAL GRANT"




THE SECOND DELUGE




CHAPTER I

COSMO VERSÁL


An undersized, lean, wizen-faced man, with an immense bald head, as
round and smooth and shining as a giant soap-bubble, and a pair of beady
black eyes, set close together, so that he resembled a gnome of amazing
brain capacity and prodigious power of concentration, sat bent over a
writing desk with a huge sheet of cardboard before him, on which he was
swiftly drawing geometrical and trigonometrical figures. Compasses,
T-squares, rulers, protractors, and ellipsographs obeyed the touch of
his fingers as if inspired with life.

The room around him was a jungle of terrestrial and celestial globes,
chemists' retorts, tubes, pipes, and all the indescribable apparatus
that modern science has invented, and which, to the uninitiated, seems
as incomprehensible as the ancient paraphernalia of alchemists and
astrologers. The walls were lined with book shelves, and adorned along
the upper portions with the most extraordinary photographs and drawings.
Even the ceiling was covered with charts, some representing the sky,
while many others were geological and topographical pictures of the face
of the earth.

Beside the drawing-board lay a pad of paper, and occasionally the little
man nervously turned to this, and, grasping a long pencil, made
elaborate calculations, covering the paper with a sprinkling of
mathematical symbols that looked like magnified animalcula. While he
worked, under a high light from a single window placed well up near the
ceiling, his forehead contracted into a hundred wrinkles, his cheeks
became feverous, his piercing eyes glowed with inner fire, and drops of
perspiration ran down in front of his ears. One would have thought that
he was laboring to save his very soul and had but a few seconds of
respite left.

Presently he threw down the pencil, and with astonishing agility let
himself rapidly, but carefully, off the stool on which he had been
sitting, keeping the palms of his hands on the seat beside his hips
until he felt his feet touch the floor. Then he darted at a book-shelf,
pulled down a ponderous tome, flapped it open in a clear space on the
floor, and dropped on his knees to consult it.

After turning a leaf or two he found what he was after, read down the
page, keeping a finger on the lines, and, having finished his reading,
jumped to his feet and hurried back to the stool, on which he mounted so
quickly that it was impossible to see how he managed it--without an
upset. Instantly he made a new diagram, and then fell to figuring
furiously on the pad, making his pencil gyrate so fast that its upper
end vibrated like the wing of a dragon-fly.

At last he threw down the pencil, and, encircling his knees with his
clasped arms, sank in a heap on the stool. The lids dropped over his
shining eyes, and he became buried in thought.

When he reopened his eyes and unbent his brows, his gaze happened to be
directed toward a row of curious big photographs which ran like a
pictured frieze round the upper side of the wall of the room. A casual
observer might have thought that the little man had been amusing himself
by photographing the explosions of fireworks on a Fourth of July night;
but it was evident by his expression that these singular pictures had no
connection with civic pyrotechnics, but must represent something of
incomparably greater importance, and, in fact, of stupendous import.

The little man's face took on a rapt look, in which wonder and fear
seemed to be blended. With a sweep of his hand he included the whole
series of photographs in a comprehensive glance, and then, settling his
gaze upon a particularly bizarre object in the center, he began to speak
aloud, although there was nobody to listen to him.

"My God!" he said. "That's it! That Lick photograph of the Lord Rosse
Nebula is its very image, except that there's no electric fire in it.
The same great whirl of outer spirals, and then comes the awful central
mass--and we're going to plunge straight into it. Then quintillions of
tons of water will condense on the earth and cover it like a universal
cloudburst. And then good-by to the human race--unless--unless--I, Cosmo
Versál, inspired by science, can save a remnant to repeople the planet
after the catastrophe."

Again, for a moment, he closed his eyes, and puckered his hemispherical
brow, while, with drawn-up knees, he seemed perilously balanced on the
high stool. Several times he slowly shook his head, like a dreaming owl,
and when his eyes reopened their fire was gone, and a reflective film
covered them. He began to speak, more deliberately than before, and in a
musing tone:

"What can I do? I don't believe there is a mountain on the face of the
globe lofty enough to lift its head above that flood. Hum, hum! It's no
use thinking about mountains! The flood will be six miles deep--six
miles from the present sea-level; my last calculation proves it beyond
all question. And that's only a minimum--it may be miles deeper, for no
mortal man can tell exactly what'll happen when the earth plunges into a
nebula.

"We'll have to float; that's the thing. I'll have to build an ark. I'll
be a second Noah. But I'll advise the whole world to build arks.

"Millions might save themselves that way, for the flood is not going to
last forever. We'll get through the nebula in a few months, and then the
waters will gradually recede, and the high lands will emerge again.
It'll be an awful long time, though; I doubt if the earth will ever be
just as it was before. There won't be much room, except for fish--but
there won't be many inhabitants for what dry land there is."

Once more he fell into silent meditation, and while he mused there came
a knock at the door. The little man started up on his seat, alert as a
squirrel, and turned his eyes over his shoulder, listening intently. The
knock was repeated--three quick sharp raps. Evidently he at once
recognized them.

"All right," he called out, and, letting himself down, ran swiftly to
the door and opened it.

A tall, thin man, with bushy black hair, heavy eyebrows, a high, narrow
forehead, and a wide, clean shaven mouth, wearing a solemn kind of
smile, entered and grasped the little man by both hands.

"Cosmo," he said, without wasting any time on preliminaries, "have you
worked it out?"

"I have just finished."

"And you find the worst?"

"Yes, worse than I ever dreamed it would be. The waters will be six
miles deep."

"Phew!" exclaimed the other, his smile fading. "That is indeed serious.
And when does it begin?"

"Inside of a year. We're within three hundred million miles of the
watery nebula now, and you know that the earth travels more than that
distance in twelve months."

"Have you seen it?"

"How could I see it--haven't I told you it is invisible? If it could be
seen all these stupid astronomers would have spotted it long ago. But
I'll tell you what I have seen."

Cosmo Versál's voice sank into a whisper, and he shuddered slightly as
he went on:

"Only last night I was sweeping the sky with the telescope when I
noticed, in Hercules and Lyra, and all that part of the heavens, a
dimming of some of the fainter stars. It was like the shadow of the
shroud of a ghost. Nobody else would have noticed it, and I wouldn't if
I had not been looking for it. It's knowledge that clarifies the eyes
and breeds knowledge, Joseph Smith. It was not truly visible, and yet I
could see that it was there. I tried to make out the shape of the
thing--but it was too indefinite. But I know very well what it is. See
here"--he suddenly broke off--"Look at that photograph." (He was
pointing at the Lord Rosse Nebula on the wall). "It's like that, only
it's coming edgewise toward us. We may miss some of the outer spirals,
but we're going smash into the center."

With fallen jaw, and black brows contracted, Joseph Smith stared at the
photograph.

"It doesn't shine like that," he said at last.

The little man snorted contemptuously.

"What have I told you about its invisibility?" he demanded.

"But how, then, do you know that it is of a watery nature?"

Cosmo Versál threw up his hands and waved them in an agony of
impatience. He climbed upon his stool to get nearer the level of the
other's eyes, and fixing him with his gaze, exclaimed:

"You know very well how I know it. I know it because I have demonstrated
with my new spectroscope, which analyzes extra-visual rays, that all
those dark nebulae that were photographed in the Milky Way years ago are
composed of watery vapor. They are far off, on the limits of the
universe. This one is one right at hand. It's a little one compared with
them--but it's enough, yes, it's enough! You know that more than two
years ago I began to correspond with astronomers all over the world
about this thing, and not one of them would listen to me. Well, they'll
listen when it's too late perhaps.

"They'll listen when the flood-gates are opened and the inundation
begins. It's not the first time that this thing has happened. I haven't
a doubt that the flood of Noah, that everybody pretends to laugh at now,
was caused by the earth passing through a watery nebula. But this will
be worse than that; there weren't two thousand million people to be
drowned then."

For five minutes neither spoke. Cosmo Versál swung on the stool, and
played with an ellipsograph; Joseph Smith dropped his chin on his breast
and nervously fingered the pockets of his long vest. At last he raised
his head and asked, in a low voice:

"What are you going to do, Cosmo?"

"I'm going to get ready," was the short reply.

"How?"

"Build an ark."

"But will you give no warning to others?"

"I'll do my best. I'll telephone to all the officials, scientific and
otherwise, in America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and Australia. I'll write
in every language to all the newspapers and magazines. I'll send out
circulars. I'll counsel everybody to drop every other occupation and
begin to build arks--but nobody will heed me. You'll see. My ark will be
the only one, but I'll save as many in it as I can. And I depend upon
you, Joseph, to help me. From all appearances, it's the only chance that
the human race has of survival.

"If I hadn't made this discovery they would all have been wiped out like
miners in a flooded pit. We may persuade a few to be saved--but what an
awful thing it is that when the truth is thrust into their very faces
people won't believe, won't listen, won't see, won't be helped, but will
die like dogs in their obstinate ignorance and blindness."

"But they will, they must, listen to you," said Joseph Smith eagerly.

"They _won't_, but I must _make_ them," replied Cosmo Versál.
"Anyhow, I must make a few of the best of them hear me. The fate of a
whole race is at stake. If we can save a handful of the best blood and
brain of mankind, the world will have a new chance, and perhaps a better
and higher race will be the result. Since I can't save them all, I'll
pick and choose. I'll have the flower of humanity in my ark. I'll at
least snatch that much from the jaws of destruction."

The little man was growing very earnest and his eyes were aglow with the
fire of enthusiastic purpose. As he dropped his head on one side, it
looked too heavy for the stemlike neck, but it conveyed an impression of
immense intellectual power. Its imposing contour lent force to his
words.

"The flower of humanity," he continued after a slight pause. "Who
composes it? I must decide that question. Is it the billionaires? Is it
the kings and rulers? Is it the men of science? Is it the society
leaders? Bah! I'll have to think on that. I can't take them all, but
I'll give them all a chance to save themselves--though I know they won't
act on the advice."

Here he paused.

"Won't the existing ships do--especially if more are built?" Joseph
Smith suddenly asked, interrupting Cosmo's train of thought.

"Not at all," was the reply. "They're not suited to the kind of
navigation that will be demanded. They're not buoyant enough, nor
manageable enough, and they haven't enough carrying capacity for power
and provisions. They'll be swamped at the wharves, or if they should get
away they'd be sent to the bottom inside a few hours. Nothing but
specially constructed arks will serve. And _there's_ more trouble
for me--I must devise a new form of vessel. Heavens, how short the time
is! Why couldn't I have found this out ten years ago? It's only to-day
that I have myself learned the full truth, though I have worked on it so
long."

"How many will you be able to carry in your ark?" asked Smith.

"I can't tell yet. That's another question to be carefully considered. I
shall build the vessel of this new metal, levium, half as heavy as
aluminum and twice as strong as steel. I ought to find room without the
slightest difficulty for a round thousand in it."

"Surely many more than that!" exclaimed Joseph Smith. "Why, there are
ocean-liners that carry several times as many."

"You forget," replied Cosmo Versál, "that we must have provisions enough
to last for a long time, because we cannot count on the immediate
re-emergence of any land, even the most mountainous, and the most
compressed food takes space when a great quantity is needed. It won't do
to overcrowd the vessel, and invite sickness. Then, too, I must take
many animals along."

"Animals," returned Smith. "I hadn't thought of that. But is it
necessary?"

"Absolutely. Would you have less foresight than Noah? I shall not
imitate him by taking male and female of every species, but I must at
least provide for restocking such land as eventually appears above the
waters with the animals most useful to man. Then, too, animals are
essential to the life of the earth. Any agricultural chemist would tell
you that. They play an indispensable part in the vital cycle of the
soil. I must also take certain species of insects and birds. I'll
telephone Professor Hergeschmitberger at Berlin to learn precisely what
are the capitally important species of the animal kingdom."

"And when will you begin the construction of the ark?"

"Instantly. There's not a moment to lose. And it's equally important to
send out warnings broadcast immediately. There you can help me. You know
what I want to say. Write it out at once; put it as strong as you can;
send it everywhere; put it in the shape of posters; hurry it to the
newspaper offices. Telephone, in my name, to the Carnegie Institution,
to the Smithsonian Institution, to the Royal Society, to the French,
Russian, Italian, German, and all the other Academies and Associations
of Science to be found anywhere on earth.

"Don't neglect the slightest means of publicity. Thank Heaven, the money
to pay for all this is not lacking. If my good father, when he piled up
his fortune from the profits of the Transcontinental Aerian Company,
could have foreseen the use to which his son would put it for the
benefit--what do I say, for the benefit? nay, for the _salvation_--of
mankind, he would have rejoiced in his work."

"Ah, that reminds me," exclaimed Joseph Smith. "I was about to ask, a
few minutes ago, why airships would not do for this business. Couldn't
people save themselves from the flood by taking refuge in the
atmosphere?"

Cosmo Versál looked at his questioner with an ironical smile.

"Do you know," he asked, "how long a dirigible can be kept afloat? Do
you know for how long a voyage the best aeroplane types can be
provisioned with power? There's not an air-ship of any kind that can go
more than two weeks at the very uttermost without touching solid earth,
and then it must be mighty sparing of its power. If we can save mankind
now, and give it another chance, perhaps the time will come when power
can be drawn out of the ether of space, and men can float in the air as
long as they choose.

"But as things are now, we must go back to Noah's plan, and trust to the
buoyant power of water. I fully expect that when the deluge begins
people will flock to the high-lands and the mountains in air-ships--but
alas! that won't save them. Remember what I have told you--this flood is
going to be six miles deep!"

The second morning after the conversation between Cosmo Versál and
Joseph Smith, New York was startled by seeing, in huge red letters, on
every blank wall, on the bare flanks of towering sky-scrapers, on the
lofty stations of aeroplane lines, on bill-boards, fences,
advertising-boards along suburban roads, in the Subway stations, and
fluttering from strings of kites over the city, the following
announcement:

  THE WORLD IS TO BE DROWNED!

  Save Yourselves While It Is Yet Time!
  Drop Your Business: It Is of No Consequence!
  Build Arks: It Is Your Only Salvation!
  The Earth Is Going To Plunge into a Watery
  Nebula: There Is No Escape!
  Hundreds of Millions Will Be Drowned: You Have
  Only a Few Months To Get Ready!
  For Particulars Address: Cosmo Versál,
  3000 Fifth Avenue.




CHAPTER II

MOCKING AT FATE


When New York recovered from its first astonishment over the
extraordinary posters, it indulged in a loud laugh. Everybody knew who
Cosmo Versál was. His eccentricities had filled many readable columns in
the newspapers. Yet there was a certain respect for him, too. This was
due to his extraordinary intellectual ability and unquestionable
scientific knowledge. But his imagination was as free as the winds, and
it often led him upon excursions in which nobody could follow him, and
which caused the more steady-going scientific brethren to shake their
heads. They called him able but flighty. The public considered him
brilliant and amusing.

His father, who had sprung from some unknown source in southeastern
Europe, and, beginning as a newsboy in New York, had made his way to the
front in the financial world, had left his entire fortune to Cosmo. The
latter had no taste for finance or business, but a devouring appetite
for science, to which, in his own way, he devoted all his powers, all
his time, and all his money. He never married, was never seen in
society, and had very few intimates--but he was known by sight, or
reputation, to everybody. There was not a scientific body or association
of any consequence in the world of which he was not a member. Those
which looked askance at his bizarre ideas were glad to accept pecuniary
aid from him.

The notion that the world was to be drowned had taken possession of him
about three years before the opening scene of this narrative. To work
out the idea, he built an observatory, set up a laboratory, invented
instruments, including his strange spectroscope, which was scoffed at by
the scientific world.

Finally, submitting the results of his observations to mathematical
treatment, he proved, to his own satisfaction, the absolute correctness
of his thesis that the well-known "proper motion of the solar system"
was about to result in an encounter between the earth and an invisible
watery nebula, which would have the effect of inundating the globe. As
this startling idea gradually took shape, he communicated it to
scientific men in all lands, but failed to find a single disciple,
except his friend Joseph Smith, who, without being able to follow all
his reasonings, accepted on trust the conclusions of Cosmo's more
powerful mind. Accordingly, at the end of his investigation, he enlisted
Smith as secretary, propagandist, and publicity agent.

New York laughed a whole day and night at the warning red letters. They
were the talk of the town. People joked about them in cafés, clubs, at
home, in the streets, in the offices, in the exchanges, in the
street-cars, on the Elevated, in the Subways. Crowds gathered on corners
to watch the flapping posters aloft on the kite lines. The afternoon
newspapers issued specials which were all about the coming flood, and
everywhere one heard the cry of the newsboys: _"Extra-a-a! Drowning of
a Thousand Million people! Cosmo Versál predicts the End of the
World!"_ On their editorial pages the papers were careful to discount
the scare lines, and terrific pictures, that covered the front sheets,
with humorous jibes at the author of the formidable prediction.

_The Owl,_ which was the only paper that put the news in half a
column of ordinary type, took a judicial attitude, called upon the city
authorities to tear down the posters, and hinted that "this absurd
person, Cosmo Versál, who disgraces a once honored name with his
childish attempt to create a sensation that may cause untold harm among
the ignorant masses," had laid himself open to criminal prosecution.

In their latest editions, several of the papers printed an interview
with Cosmo Versál, in which he gave figures and calculations that, on
their face, seemed to offer mathematical proof of the correctness of his
forecast. In impassioned language, he implored the public to believe
that he would not mislead them, spoke of the instant necessity of
constructing arks of safety, and averred that the presence of the
terrible nebula that was so soon to drown the world was already manifest
in the heavens.

Some readers of these confident statements began to waver, especially
when confronted with mathematics which they could not understand. But
still, in general, the laugh went on. It broke into boisterousness in
one of the largest theaters where a bright-witted "artist," who always
made a point of hitting off the very latest sensation, got himself up in
a lifelike imitation of the well-known figure of Cosmo Versál, topped
with a bald head as big as a bushel, and sailed away into the flies with
a pretty member of the ballet, whom he had gallantly snatched from a
tumbling ocean of green baize, singing at the top of his voice until
they disappeared behind the proscenium arch:

  "Oh, th' Nebula is coming
    To drown the wicked earth,
  With all his spirals humming
    'S he waltzes in his mirth.

  _Chorus_
  "Don't hesitate a second,
    Get ready to embark,
  And skip away to safety
    With Cosmo and his ark.

  "Th' Nebula is a direful bird
    'S he skims the ether blue!
  He's angry over what he's heard,
    'N's got his eye on you.

  _Chorus_
  "Don't hesitate a second, etc.

  "When Nebulas begin to pipe
    The bloomin' O.H.[subscript]2
  Y'bet yer life the time is ripe
    To think what you will do.

  _Chorus_
  "Don't hesitate a second, etc.

  "He'll tip th' Atlantic o'er its brim,
    And swamp the mountains tall;
  He'll let the broad Pacific in,
    And leave no land at all.

  _Chorus_
  "Don't hesitate a second, etc.

  "He's got an option on the spheres;
    He's leased the Milky Way;
  He's caught the planets in arrears,
    'N's bound to make 'em pay.

  _Chorus_
  "Don't hesitate a second, etc."

The roars of laughter and applause with which this effusion of
vaudeville genius was greeted, showed the cheerful spirit in which the
public took the affair. No harm seemed to have come to the "ignorant
masses" yet.

But the next morning there was a suspicious change in the popular mind.
People were surprised to see new posters in place of the old ones, more
lurid in letters and language than the original. The morning papers had
columns of description and comment, and some of them seemed disposed to
treat the prophet and his prediction with a certain degree of
seriousness.

The savants who had been interviewed overnight, did not talk very
convincingly, and made the mistake of flinging contempt on both Cosmo
and "the gullible public."

Naturally, the public wouldn't stand for that, and the pendulum of
opinion began to swing the other way. Cosmo helped his cause by sending
to every newspaper a carefully prepared statement of his observations
and calculations, in which he spoke with such force of conviction that
few could read his words without feeling a thrill of apprehensive
uncertainty. This was strengthened by published dispatches which showed
that he had forwarded his warnings to all the well-known scientific
bodies of the world, which, while decrying them, made no effective
response.

And then came a note of positive alarm in a double-leaded bulletin from
the new observatory at Mount McKinley, which affirmed that during the
preceding night _a singular obscurity_ had been suspected in the
northern sky, seeming to veil many stars below the twelfth magnitude. It
was added that the phenomenon was unprecedented, but that the
observation was both difficult and uncertain.

Nowhere was the atmosphere of doubt and mystery, which now began to hang
over the public, so remarkable as in Wall Street. The sensitive currents
there responded like electric waves to the new influence, and, to the
dismay of hard-headed observers, the market dropped as if it had been
hit with a sledge-hammer. Stocks went down five, ten, in some cases
twenty points in as many minutes.

The speculative issues slid down like wheat into a bin when the chutes
are opened. Nobody could trace the exact origin of the movement, but
selling-orders came tumbling in until there was a veritable panic.

From London, Paris, Berlin, Vienna, St. Petersburg, flashed dispatches
announcing that the same unreasonable slump had manifested itself there,
and all united in holding Cosmo Versál solely responsible for the
foolish break in prices. Leaders of finance rushed to the exchanges
trying by arguments and expostulations to arrest the downfall, but in
vain.

In the afternoon, however, reason partially resumed its sway; then a
quick recovery was felt, and many who had rushed to sell all they had,
found cause to regret their precipitancy. The next day all was on the
mend, as far as the stock market was concerned, but among the people at
large the poison of awakened credulity continued to spread, nourished by
fresh announcements from the fountain head.

Cosmo issued another statement to the effect that he had perfected plans
for an ark of safety, which he would begin at once to construct in the
neighborhood of New York, and he not only offered freely to give his
plans to any who wished to commence construction on their own account,
but he urged them, in the name of Heaven, to lose no time. This produced
a prodigious effect, and multitudes began to be infected with a nameless
fear.

Meanwhile an extraordinary scene occurred, behind closed doors, at the
headquarters of the Carnegie Institution in Washington. Joseph Smith,
acting under Cosmo Versál's direction, had forwarded an elaborate
_précis_ of the latter's argument, accompanied with full
mathematical details, to the head of the institution. The character of
this document was such that it could not be ignored. Moreover, the
savants composing the council of the most important scientific
association in the world were aware of the state of the public mind, and
felt that it was incumbent upon them to do something to allay the alarm.
Of late years a sort of supervisory control over scientific news of all
kinds had been accorded to them, and they appreciated the fact that a
duty now rested upon their shoulders.

Accordingly, a special meeting was called to consider the communication
from Cosmo Versál. It was the general belief that a little critical
examination would result in complete proof of the fallacy of all his
work, proof which could be put in a form that the most uninstructed
would understand.

But the papers, diagrams, and mathematical formulae had no sooner been
spread upon the table under the knowing eyes of the learned members of
the council, than a chill of conscious impuissance ran through them.
They saw that Cosmo's mathematics were unimpeachable. His formulae were
accurately deduced, and his operations absolutely correct.

They could do nothing but attack his fundamental data, based on the
alleged revelations of his new form of spectroscope, and on telescopic
observations which were described in so much detail that the only way to
combat them was by the general assertion that they were illusory. This
was felt to be a very unsatisfactory method of procedure, as far as the
public was concerned, because it amounted to no more than attacking the
credibility of a witness who pretended to describe only what he himself
had seen--and there is nothing so hard as to prove a negative.

Then, Cosmo had on his side the whole force of that curious tendency of
the human mind which habitually gravitates toward whatever is
extraordinary, revolutionary, and mysterious.

But a yet greater difficulty arose. Mention has been made of the strange
bulletin from the Mount McKinley observatory. That had been incautiously
sent out to the public by a thoughtless observer, who was more intent
upon describing a singular phenomenon than upon considering its possible
effect on the popular imagination. He had immediately received an
expostulatory dispatch from headquarters which henceforth shut his
mouth--but he had told the simple truth, and how embarrassing that was
became evident when, on the very table around which the savants were now
assembled, three dispatches were laid in quick succession from the great
observatories of Mount Hekla, Iceland, the North Cape, and Kamchatka,
all corroborating the statement of the Mount McKinley observer, that an
inexplicable veiling of faint stars had manifested itself in the boreal
quarter of the sky.

When the president read these dispatches--which the senders had taken
the precaution to mark "confidential"--the members of the council looked
at one another with no little dismay. Here was the most unprejudiced
corroboration of Cosmo Versál's assertion that the great nebula was
already within the range of observation. How could they dispute such
testimony, and what were they to make of it?

Two or three of the members began to be shaken in their convictions.

"Upon my word," exclaimed Professor Alexander Jones, "but this is very
curious! And suppose the fellow should be right, after all?"

"Right!" cried the president, Professor Pludder, disdainfully. "Who ever
heard of a watery nebula? The thing's absurd!"

"I don't see that it's absurd," replied Professor Jones. "There's plenty
of proof of the existence of hydrogen in some of the nebulae."

"So there is," chimed in Professor Abel Able, "and if there's hydrogen
there may be oxygen, and there you have all that's necessary. It's not
the idea that a nebula may consist of watery vapor that's absurd, but it
is that a watery nebula, large enough to drown the earth by condensation
upon it could have approached so near as this one must now be without
sooner betraying its presence."

"How so?" demanded a voice.

"By its attraction. Cosmo Versál says it is already less than three
hundred million miles away. If it is massive enough to drown the earth,
it ought long ago to have been discovered by its disturbance of the
planetary orbits."

"Not at all," exclaimed Professor Jeremiah Moses. "If you stick to that
argument you'll be drowned sure. Just look at these facts. The earth
weighs six and a half sextillions of tons, and the ocean one and a half
quintillions. The average depth of the oceans is two and one-fifth
miles. Now--if the level of the oceans were raised only about 1,600
feet, practically all the inhabited parts of the world would be flooded.
To cause that increase in the level of the oceans only about one-eighth
part would have to be added to their total mass, or, say, one-seventh
part, allowing for the greater surface to be covered. That would be one
thirty-thousandth of the weight of the globe, and if you suppose that
only one-hundredth of the entire nebula were condensed on the earth, the
whole mass of the nebula would not need to exceed one three-hundredth of
the weight of the earth, or a quarter that of the moon--and nobody here
will be bold enough to say that the approach of a mass no greater than
that would be likely to be discovered through its attraction when it was
three hundred million miles away."

Several of the astronomers present shook their heads at this, and
Professor Pludder irritably declared that it was absurd.

"The attraction would be noticeable when it was a thousand millions of
miles away," he continued.

"Yes, 'noticeable' I admit," replied Professor Moses, "but all the same
you wouldn't notice it, because you wouldn't be looking for it unless
the nebula were visible first, and even then it would require months of
observation to detect the effects. And how are you going to get around
those bulletins? The thing is beginning to be visible now, and I'll bet
that if, from this time on, you study carefully the planetary motions,
you will find evidence of the disturbance becoming stronger and
stronger. Versál has pointed out that very thing, and calculated the
perturbations. This thing has come like a thief in the night."

"You'd better hurry up and secure a place in the ark," said Professor
Pludder sarcastically.

"I don't know but I shall, if I can get one," returned Professor Moses.
"You may not think this is such a laughing matter a few months hence."

"I'm surprised," pursued the president, "that a man of your scientific
standing should stultify himself by taking seriously such balderdash as
this. I tell you the thing is absurd."

"And I tell you, _you_ are absurd to say so!" retorted Professor
Moses, losing his temper. "You've got four of the biggest telescopes in
the world under your control; why don't you order your observers to look
for this thing?"

Professor Pludder, who was a very big man, reared up his rotund form,
and, bringing his fist down upon the table with a resounding whack,
exclaimed:

"I'll do nothing so ridiculous! These bulletins have undoubtedly been
influenced by the popular excitement. There has possibly been a little
obscurity in the atmosphere--cirrus clouds, or something--and the
observers have imagined the rest. I'm not going to insult science by
encouraging the proceedings of a mountebank like Cosmo Versál. What
we've got to do is to prepare a dispatch for the press reassuring the
populace and throwing the weight of this institution on the side of
common sense and public tranquillity. Let the secretary indite such a
dispatch, and then we'll edit it and send it out."

Professor Pludder, naturally dictatorial, was sometimes a little
overbearing, but being a man of great ability, and universally respected
for his high rank in the scientific world, his colleagues usually bowed
to his decisions. On this occasion his force of character sufficed to
silence the doubters, and when the statement intended for the press had
received its final touches it contained no hint of the seeds of discord
that Cosmo Versál had sown among America's foremost savants. The next
morning it appeared in all the newspapers as follows:

    _Official Statement from the Carnegie Institution_

    In consequence of the popular excitement caused by the
    sensational utterance of a notorious pretender to scientific
    knowledge in New York, the council of this institution
    authorizes the statement that it has examined the alleged
    grounds on which the prediction of a great flood, to be caused
    by a nebula encountering the earth, is based, and finds, as all
    real men of science knew beforehand, that the entire matter is
    simply a canard.

    The nebulae are not composed of water; if they were composed of
    water they could not cause a flood on the earth; the report that
    some strange, misty object is visible in the starry heavens is
    based on a misapprehension; and finally, the so-called
    calculations of the author of this inexcusable hoax are baseless
    and totally devoid of validity.

    The public is earnestly advised to pay no further attention to
    the matter. If there were any danger to the earth--and such a
    thing is not to be seriously considered--astronomers would know
    it long in advance, and would give due and official warning.

Unfortunately for the popular effect of this pronouncement, on the very
morning when it appeared in print, thirty thousand people were crowded
around the old aviation field at Mineola, excitedly watching Cosmo
Versál, with five hundred workmen, laying the foundations of a huge
platform, while about the field were stretched sheets of canvas
displaying the words:

  THE ARK OF SAFETY
  Earnest Inspection Invited by All
  Attendants will Furnish Gratis Plans for Similar
  Constructions
  Small Arks Can Be Built for Families
  Act While There Is Yet Time

The multitude saw at a glance that here was a work that would cost
millions, and the spectacle of this immense expenditure, the evidence
that Cosmo was backing his words with his money, furnished a silent
argument which was irresistible. In the midst of all, flying about among
his men, was Cosmo, impressing every beholder with the feeling that
intellect was in charge.

Like the gray coat of Napoleon on a battlefield, the sight of that
mighty brow bred confidence.




CHAPTER III

THE FIRST DROPS OF THE DELUGE


The utterance of the Carnegie Institution indeed fell flat, and Cosmo
Versál's star reigned in the ascendent. He pushed his preparations with
amazing speed, and not only politics, but even the war that had just
broken out in South America was swallowed up in the newspapers by
endless descriptions of the mysterious proceedings at Mineola. Cosmo
still found time every day to write articles and to give out interviews;
and Joseph Smith was kept constantly on the jump, running for
street-cars or trains, or leaping, with his long coat flapping, into and
out of elevators on ceaseless missions to the papers, the scientific
societies, and the meetings of learned or unlearned bodies which had
been persuaded to investigate the subject of the coming flood. Between
the work of preparation and that of proselytism it is difficult to see
how Cosmo found time to sleep.

Day by day the Ark of Safety rose higher upon its great platform, its
huge metallic ribs and broad, bulging sides glinting strangely in the
unbroken sunshine--for, as if imitating the ominous quiet before an
earthquake, the July sky had stripped itself of all clouds. No
thunder-storms broke the serenity of the long days, and never had the
overarching heavens seemed so spotless and motionless in their cerulean
depths.

All over the world, as the news dispatches showed, the same strange calm
prevailed. Cosmo did not fail to call attention to this unparalleled
repose of nature as a sure prognostic of the awful event in preparation.

The heat became tremendous. Hundreds were stricken down in the blazing
streets. Multitudes fled to the seashore, and lay panting under
umbrellas on the burning sands, or vainly sought relief by plunging into
the heated water, which, rolling lazily in with the tide, felt as if it
had come from over a boiler.

Still, perspiring crowds constantly watched the workmen, who struggled
with the overpowering heat, although Cosmo had erected canvas screens
for them and installed a hundred immense electric fans to create a
breeze.

Beginning with five hundred men, he had, in less than a month, increased
his force to nearer five thousand, many of whom, not engaged in the
actual construction, were preparing the materials and bringing them
together. The ark was being made of pure levium, the wonderful new metal
which, although already employed in the construction of aeroplanes and
the framework of dirigible balloons, had not before been used for
shipbuilding, except in the case of a few small boats, and these used
only in the navy.

For mere raw material Cosmo must have expended an enormous sum, and his
expenses were quadrupled by the fact that he was compelled, in order to
save time, practically to lease several of the largest steel plants in
the country. Fortunately levium was easily rolled into plates, and the
supply was sufficient, owing to the discovery two years before of an
expeditious process of producing the metal from its ores.

The wireless telegraph and telephone offices were besieged by
correspondents eager to send inland, and all over Europe and Asia, the
latest particulars of the construction of the great ark. Nobody followed
Cosmo's advice or example, but everybody was intensely interested and
puzzled.

At last the government officials found themselves forced to take
cognizance of the affair. They could no longer ignore it after they
discovered that it was seriously interfering with the conduct of public
business. Cosmo Versál's pressing orders, accompanied by cash, displaced
or delayed orders of the government commanding materials for the navy
and the air fleet. In consequence, about the middle of July he received
a summons to visit the President of the United States. Cosmo hurried to
Washington on the given date, and presented his card at the White House.
He was shown immediately into the President's reception-room, where he
found the entire Cabinet in presence. As he entered he was the focus of
a formidable battery of curious and not too friendly eyes.

President Samson was a large, heavy man, more than six feet tall. Every
member of his Cabinet was above the average in avoirdupois, and the
heavyweight president of the Carnegie Institution, Professor Pludder,
who had been specially invited, added by his presence to the air of
ponderosity that characterized the assemblage. All seemed magnified by
the thin white garments which they wore on account of the oppressive
heat. Many of them had come in haste from various summer resorts, and
were plainly annoyed by the necessity of attending at the President's
command.

Cosmo Versál was the only cool man there, and his diminutive form
presented a striking contrast to the others. But he looked as if he
carried more brains than all of them put together.

He was not in the least overawed by the hostile glances of the
statesmen. On the contrary, his lips perceptibly curled, in a
half-disdainful smile, as he took the big hand which the President
extended to him. As soon as Cosmo Versál had sunk into the embrace of a
large easy chair, the President opened the subject.

"I have directed you to come," he said in a majestic tone, "in order the
sooner to dispel the effects of your unjustifiable predictions and
extraordinary proceedings on the public mind--and, I may add, on public
affairs. Are you aware that you have interfered with the measures of
this government for the defense of the country? You have stepped in
front of the government, and delayed the beginning of four battleships
which Congress has authorized in urgent haste on account of the
threatening aspect of affairs in the East? I need hardly say to you that
we shall, if necessary, find means to set aside the private agreements
under which you are proceeding, as inimical to public interests, but you
have already struck a serious blow at the security of your country."

The President pronounced the last sentence with oratorical unction, and
Cosmo was conscious of an approving movement of big official shoulders
around him. The disdain deepened on his lips.

After a moment's pause the President continued:

"Before proceeding to extremities I have wished to see you personally,
in order, in the first place, to assure myself that you are mentally
responsible, and then to appeal to your patriotism, which should lead
you to withdraw at once an obstruction so dangerous to the nation. Do
you know the position in which you have placed yourself?"

Cosmo Versál got upon his feet and advanced to the center of the room
like a little David. Every eye was fixed upon him. His voice was steady,
but intense with suppressed nervousness.

"Mr. President," he said, "you have accused me of obstructing the
measures of the government for the defense of the country. Sir, I am
trying to save the whole human race from a danger in comparison with
which that of war is infinitesimal--a danger which is rushing down upon
us with appalling speed, and which will strike every land on the globe
simultaneously. Within seven months not a warship or any other existing
vessel will remain afloat."

The listeners smiled, and nodded significantly to one another, but the
speaker only grew more earnest.

"You think I am insane," he said, "but the truth is you are hoodwinked
by official stupidity. That man," pointing at Professor Pludder, "who
knows me well, and who has had all my proofs laid before him, is either
too thick-headed to understand a demonstration or too pig-headed to
confess his own error."

"Come, come," interrupted the President sternly, while Professor Pludder
flushed very red, "this will not do! Indulge in no personalities here. I
have, strained a point in offering to listen to you at all, and I have
invited the head of the greatest of our scientific societies to be
present, with the hope that here before us all he might convince you of
your folly, and thus bring the whole unfortunate affair promptly to an
end."

"_He_ convince _me_ !" cried Cosmo Versál disdainfully. "He is
incapable of understanding the A, B, C of my work. But let me tell you
this, Mr. President--there are men in his own council who are not so
blind. I know what occurred at the recent meeting of that council, and I
know that the ridiculous announcement put forth in its name to deceive
the public was whipped into shape by him, and does not express the real
opinion of many of the members."

Professor Pludder's face grew redder than ever.

"Name one!" he thundered.

"Ah," said Cosmo sneeringly, "that hits hard, doesn't it? You want me to
name _one_; well, I'll name _three_. What did Professor
Alexander Jones and Professor Abel Able say about the existence of
watery nebula, and what was the opinion expressed by Professor Jeremiah
Moses about the actual approach of one out of the northern sky, and what
it could do if it hit the earth? What was the unanimous opinion of the
entire council about the correctness of my mathematical work? And what,"
he continued, approaching Professor Pludder and shaking his finger up at
him--"_what have you done with those three dispatches from Iceland,
the North Cape, and Kamchatka, which absolutely confirmed my
announcement that the nebula was already visible?_"

Professor Pludder began stammeringly:

"Some spy--"

"Ah," cried Cosmo, catching him up, "_a spy_, hey? Then, you admit
it! Mr. President, I beg you to notice that he admits it. Sir, this is a
conspiracy to conceal the truth. Great Heaven, the world is on the point
of being drowned, and yet the pride of officialism is so strong in this
plodder--Pludder--and others of his ilk that they'd sooner take the
chance of letting the human race be destroyed than recognize the truth!"

Cosmo Versál spoke with such tremendous concentration of mental energy,
and with such evident sincerity of conviction, and he had so plainly put
Professor Pludder to rout, that the President, no less than the other
listening statesmen, was thrown into a quandary.

There was a creaking of heavily burdened chairs, a ponderous stir all
round the circle, while a look of perplexity became visible on every
face. Professor Pludder's conduct helped to produce the change of moral
atmosphere. He had been so completely surprised by Cosmo's accusation,
based on facts which he had supposed were known only to himself and the
council, that he was unable for a minute to speak at all, and before he
could align his faculties his triumphant little opponent renewed the
attack.

"Mr. President," he said, laying his hand on the arm of Mr. Samson's big
chair, which was nearly on a level with his breast, and speaking with
persuasive earnestness, "you are the executive head of a mighty
nation--the nation that sets the pace for the world. It is in your power
to do a vast, an incalculable, service to humanity. One official word
from you would save millions upon millions of lives. I implore you,
instead of interfering with my work, to give instant order for the
construction of as many arks, based upon the plans I have perfected, as
the navy yard can possibly turn out. Issue a proclamation to the people,
warning them that this is their only chance of escape."

By a curious operation of the human mind, this speech cost Cosmo nearly
all the advantage that he had previously gained. His ominous suggestion
of a great nebula rushing out of the heavens to overwhelm the earth had
immensely impressed the imagination of his hearers, and his
uncontradicted accusation that Professor Pludder was concealing the
facts had almost convinced them that he was right. But when he mentioned
"arks," the strain was relieved, and a smile broke out on the broad face
of the President. He shook his head, and was about to speak, when Cosmo,
perceiving that he had lost ground, changed his tactics.

"Still you are incredulous!" he exclaimed. "But the proof is before you!
Look at the blazing heavens! The annals of meteorology do not record
another such summer as this. The vanguard of the fatal nebula is already
upon us. The signs of disaster are in the sky. But, note what I
say--this is only the _first_ sign. There is another following on
its heels which may be here at any moment. To heat will succeed cold,
and as we rush through the tenuous outer spirals the earth will
alternately be whipped with tempests of snow and sleet, and scorched by
fierce outbursts of solar fire. For three weeks the atmosphere has been
heated by the inrush of invisible vapor--but look out, I warn you, for
the change that is impending!"

These extraordinary words, pronounced with the wild air of a prophet,
completed the growing conviction of the listeners that they really had a
madman to deal with, and Professor Pludder, having recovered his
self--command, rose to his feet.

"Mr. President," he began, "the evidence which we have just seen of an
unbalanced mind--"

He got no further. A pall of darkness suddenly dropped upon the room. An
inky curtain seemed to have fallen from the sky. At the same time the
windows were shaken by tremendous blasts of wind, and, as the electric
lights were hastily turned on, huge snowflakes, intermingled with
rattling hailstones, were seen careering outside. In a few seconds
several large panes of glass were broken, and the chilling wind,
sweeping round the apartment, made the teeth of the thinly clad
statesmen chatter, while the noise of the storm became deafening. The
sky lightened, but at the same moment dreadful thunderpeals shook the
building. Two or three trees in the White House grounds were struck by
the bolts, and their broken branches were driven through the air and
carried high above the ground by the whirling winds, and one of them was
thrown against the building with such force that for a moment it seemed
as if the wall had been shattered.

After the first stunning effect of this outbreak of the elements had
passed, everybody rushed to the windows to look out--everybody except
Cosmo Versál, who remained standing in the center of the room.

"I told you!" he said; but nobody listened to him. What they saw outside
absorbed every faculty. The noise was so stunning that they could not
have heard him.

We have said that the air lightened after the passage of the first pall
of darkness, but it was not the reappearance of the sun that caused the
brightening. It was an awful light, which seemed to be born out of the
air itself. It had a menacing, coppery hue, continually changing in
character. The whole upper atmosphere was choked with dense clouds,
which swirled and tumbled, and twisted themselves into great vortical
rolls, spinning like gigantic millshafts. Once, one of these vortexes
shot downward, with projectile speed, rapidly assuming the terrible form
of the trombe of a tornado, and where it struck the ground it tore
everything to pieces--trees, houses, the very earth itself were ground
to powder and then whirled aloft by the resistless suction.

Occasionally the darkness returned for a few minutes, as if a cover had
been clapped upon the sky, and then, again, the murk would roll off, and
the reddish gleam would reappear. These swift alternations of
impenetrable gloom and unearthly light shook the hearts of the
dumfounded statesmen even more than the roar and rush of the storm.

A cry of horror broke from the onlookers when a man and a woman suddenly
appeared trying to cross the White House grounds to reach a place of
comparative safety, and were caught up by the wind, clinging desperately
to each other, and hurled against a wall, at whose base they fell in a
heap.

Then came another outburst of lightning, and a vicious bolt descended
upon the Washington Monument, and, twisting round it, seemed to envelop
the great shaft in a pulsating corkscrew of blinding fire. The report
that instantly followed made the White House dance upon its foundations,
and, as if that had been a signal, the flood-gates of the sky
immediately opened, and rain so dense that it looked like a solid
cataract of water poured down upon the earth. The raging water burst
into the basement of the building, and ran off in a shoreless river
toward the Potomac.

The streaming rain, still driven by the wind, poured through the broken
windows, driving the President and the others to the middle of the room,
where they soon stood in rills of water soaking the thick carpet.

They were all as pale as death. Their eyes sought one another's faces in
dumb amazement. Cosmo Versál alone retained perfect self-command. In
spite of his slight stature he looked their master. Raising his voice to
the highest pitch, in order to be heard, he shouted:

"These are the first drops of the Deluge! Will you believe now?"




CHAPTER IV

THE WORLD SWEPT WITH TERROR


The tempest of hail, snow, lightning, and rain, which burst so
unexpectedly over Washington, was not a local phenomenon. It leveled the
antennae of the wireless telegraph systems all over the world, cutting
off communication everywhere. Only the submarine telephone cables
remained unaffected, and by them was transmitted the most astonishing
news of the ravages of the storm. Rivers had careered over their banks,
low-lying towns were flooded, the swollen sewers of cities exploded and
inundated the streets, and gradually news came in from country districts
showing that vast areas of land had been submerged, and hundreds
drowned.

The downfall of rain far exceeded everything that the meteorological
bureaus had ever recorded.

The vagaries of the lightning, and the frightful power that it
exhibited, were especially terrifying.

In London the Victoria Tower was partly dismantled by a bolt.

In Moscow the ancient and beautiful Church of St. Basil was nearly
destroyed.

The celebrated Leaning Tower of Pisa, the wonder of centuries, was flung
to the ground.

The vast dome of St. Peter's at Rome was said to have been encased
during three whole minutes with a blinding armor of electric fire,
though the only harm done was the throwing down of a statue in one of
the chapels.

But, strangest freak of all, in New York a tremendous bolt, which seems
to have entered the Pennsylvania tunnel on the Jersey side, followed the
rails under the river, throwing two trains from the track, and, emerging
in the great station in the heart of the city, expanded into a
rose-colored sphere, which exploded with an awful report, and blew the
great roof to pieces. And yet, although the fragments were scattered a
dozen blocks away, hundreds of persons who were in the stations suffered
no other injury than such as resulted from being flung violently to the
floor, or against the walls.

Cosmo Versál's great ark seemed charmed. Not a single discharge of
lightning occurred in its vicinity, a fact which he attributed to the
dielectric properties of levium. Nevertheless, the wind carried away all
his screens and electric fans.

If this storm had continued the predicted deluge would unquestionably
have occurred at once, and even its prophet would have perished through
having begun his preparations too late. But the disturbed elements sank
into repose as suddenly as they had broken out with fury. The rain did
not last, in most places, more than twenty-four hours, although the
atmosphere continued to be filled with troubled clouds for a week. At
the end of that time the sun reappeared, as hot as before, and a
spotless dome once more over-arched the earth; but from this time the
sky never resumed its former brilliant azure--there was always a strange
coppery tinge, the sight of which was appalling, although it gradually
lost its first effect through familiarity.

The indifference and derision with which Cosmo's predictions and
elaborate preparations had hitherto been regarded now vanished, and the
world, in spite of itself, shivered with vague apprehension. No
reassurances from those savants who still refused to admit the validity
of Cosmo Versál's calculations and deductions had any permanent effect
upon the public mind.

With amusing inconsequence people sold stocks again, until all the
exchanges were once more swept with panic--and then put the money in
their strong boxes, as if they thought that the mere possession of the
lucre could protect them. They hugged the money and remained deaf to
Cosmo's reiterated advice to build arks with it.

After all, they were only terrified, not convinced, and they felt that,
somehow, everything would come out right, now that they had their
possessions well in hand.

For, in spite of the scare, nobody really believed that an actual deluge
was coming. There might be great floods, and great suffering and loss,
but the world was not going to be drowned! Such things only occurred in
early and dark ages.

Some nervous persons found comfort in the fact that when the skies
cleared after the sudden downpour brilliant rainbows were seen. Their
hearts bounded with joy.

"The 'Bow of Promise!'" they cried. "Behold the unvarying assurance that
the world shall never again be drowned."

Then a great revival movement was set on foot, starting in the
Mississippi valley under the leadership of an eloquent exhorter, who
declared that, although a false prophet had arisen, whose delusive
prediction was contrary to Scripture, yet it was true that the world was
about to be punished in unexpected ways for its many iniquities.

This movement rapidly spread all over the country, and was taken up in
England and throughout Protestant Europe, and soon prayers were offered
in thousands of churches to avert the wrath of Heaven. Multitudes thus
found their fears turned into a new direction, and by a strange
reaction, Cosmo Versál came to be regarded as a kind of Antichrist who
was seeking to mislead mankind.

Just at this juncture, to add to the dismay and uncertainty, a grand and
fearful comet suddenly appeared. It came up unexpectedly from the south,
blazed brightly close beside the sun, even at noonday, and a few nights
later was visible after sunset with an immense fiery head and a broad
curved tail that seemed to pulsate from end to end. It was so bright
that it cast shadows at night, as distinct as those made by the moon. No
such cometary monster had ever before been seen. People shuddered when
they looked at it. It moved with amazing speed, sweeping across the
firmament like a besom of destruction. Calculation showed that it was
not more than 3,000,000 miles from the earth.

But one night the wonder and dread awakened by the comet were magnified
a hundredfold by an occurrence so unexpected and extraordinary that the
spectators gasped in amazement.

The writer happens to have before him an entry in a diary, which is,
probably, the sole contemporary record of this event. It was written in
the city of Washington by no less a person than Professor Jeremiah
Moses, of the Council of the Carnegie Institution. Let it tell its own
story:

"A marvelous thing happened this night. I walked out into the park near
my house with the intention of viewing the great comet. The park on my
side (the west), is bordered with a dense screen of tall trees, and I
advanced toward the open place in the center in order to have an
unobstructed sight of the flaming stranger. As I passed across the edge
of the shadow of the trees--the ground ahead being brilliantly
illuminated by the light of the comet--I suddenly noticed, with an
involuntary start, that I was being preceded by a _double shadow_,
with a black center, which forked away from my feet.

"I cast my eyes behind me to find the cause of the phenomenon, and saw,
to my inexpressible amazement, that _the comet had divided into
two_. There were two distinct heads, already widely separated, but
each, it seemed to me, as brilliant as the original one had been, and
each supplied with a vast plume of fire a hundred degrees in length, and
consequently stretching far past the zenith. The cause of the double
shadow was evident at once--but what can have produced this sudden
disruption of the comet? It must have occurred since last evening, and
already, if the calculated distance of the comet is correct, the parts
of the severed head are 300,000 miles asunder!"

Underneath this entry was scribbled:

"Can this have anything to do with Cosmo Versál's flood?"

Whether it had anything to do with the flood or not, at any rate the
public believed that it had. People went about with fear written on
their faces.

The double shadows had a surprising effect. The phantasm was pointed
out, and stared at with superstitious terror by thousands every night.
The fact that there was nothing really mysterious about it made no
difference. Even those who knew well that it was an inevitable optical
result of the division of the bright comet were thrilled with
instinctive dread when they saw that forked umbra, mimicking their every
movement. There is nothing that so upsets the mind as a sudden change in
the aspect of familiar things.

The astronomers now took their turn. Those who were absolutely
incredulous about Cosmo's prediction, and genuinely desirous of allaying
the popular alarm, issued statements in which, with a disingenuousness
that may have been unintentional, they tried to sidetrack his arguments.

Professor Pludder led the way with a pronunciamento declaring that "the
absurd vaporings of the modern Nostradamus of New York" had now
demonstrated their own emptiness.

"A comet," said Professor Pludder, with reassuring seriousness, "cannot
drown the earth. It is composed of rare gases, which, as the experience
of Halley's comet many years ago showed, are unable to penetrate the
atmosphere even when an actual encounter occurs. In this case there
cannot even be an encounter; the comet is now moving away. Its division
is not an unprecedented occurrence, for many previous comets have met
with similar accidents. This comet happened to be of unusual size, and
the partition of the head occurred when it was relatively nearby--whence
the startling phenomena observed. There is nothing to be feared."

It will be remarked that Professor Pludder entirely avoided the real
issue. Cosmo Versál had never said that the comet would drown the earth.
In fact, he had been as much surprised by its appearance as everybody
else. But when he read Professor Pludder's statement, followed by others
of similar import, he took up the cudgels with a vengeance. All over the
world, translated into a dozen languages, he scattered his reply, and
the effect was startling.

"My fellow-citizens of the world in all lands, and of every race," he
began, "you are face to face with destruction! And yet, while its
heralds are plainly signaling from the sky, and shaking the earth with
lightning to awaken it, blind leaders of blind try to deceive you!

"They are defying science itself!

"They say that the comet cannot touch the earth. That is true. It is
passing away. I myself did not foresee its coming. It arrived by
accident, _but every step that it has made through the silent depths
of space has been a proclamation of the presence of the nebula_,
which is the real agent of the perdition of the world!

"Why that ominous redness which overcasts the heavens? You have all
noticed it. Why that blinding brightness which the comet has displayed,
exceeding all that has ever been beheld in such visitors. The
explanation is plain: the comet has been feeding on the substance of the
nebula, which is rare yet because we have only encountered some of its
outlying spirals.

"But it is coming on with terrible speed. In a few short months we shall
be plunged into its awful center, and then the oceans will swell to the
mountaintops, and the continents will become the bottoms of angry seas.

"When the flood begins it will be too late to save yourselves. You have
already lost too much precious time. I tell you solemnly that not one in
a million can now be saved. Throw away every other consideration, and
try, try desperately, to be of the little company of those who escape!

"Remember that your only chance is in building arks--arks of levium, the
metal that floats. I have sent broadcast plans for such arks. They can
be made of any size, but the larger the better. In my own ark I can take
only a selected number, and when the complement is made up not another
soul will be admitted.

"I have established all my facts by mathematical proofs. The most expert
mathematicians of the world have been unable to detect any error in my
calculations. They try to dispute the data, but the data are already
before you for your own judgment. The heavens are so obscured that only
the brightest stars can now be seen." (This was a fact which had caused
bewilderment in the observatories.) "The recent outburst of storms and
floods was the second sign of the approaching end, and the third sign
will not be long delayed--and after that the deluge!"

It is futile to try to describe the haunting fear and horror which
seized upon the majority of the millions who read these words. Business
was paralyzed, for men found it impossible to concentrate their minds
upon ordinary affairs. Every night the twin comets, still very bright,
although they were fast retreating, brandished their fiery scimitars in
the sky--more fearful to the imagination now, since Cosmo Versál had
declared that it was the nebula that stimulated their energies. And by
day the sky was watched with anxious eyes striving to detect signs of a
deepening of the menacing hue, which, to an excited fancy, suggested a
tinge of blood.

Now, at last, Cosmo's warnings and entreaties bore practical fruit. Men
began to inquire about places in his ark, and to make preparations for
building arks of their own.

He had not been interfered with after his memorable interview with the
President of the United States, and had pushed his work at Mineola with
redoubled energy, employing night gangs of workmen so that progress was
continuous throughout the twenty-four hours.

Standing on its platform, the ark, whose hull was approaching
completion, rose a hundred feet into the air. It was 800 feet long and
250 broad--proportions which practical ship-builders ridiculed, but
Cosmo, as original in this as in everything else, declared that, taking
into account the buoyancy of levium, no other form would answer as well.
He estimated that when its great engines were in place, its immense
stores of material for producing power, its ballast, and its supplies of
food stowed away, and its cargo of men and animals taken aboard, it
would not draw more than twenty feet of water.

Hardly a day passed now without somebody coming to Cosmo to inquire
about the best method of constructing arks. He gave the required
information, in all possible detail, with the utmost willingness. He
drew plans and sketches, made all kinds of practical suggestions, and
never failed to urge the utmost haste. He inspired every visitor at the
same time with alarm and a resolution to go to work at once.

Some did go to work. But their progress was slow, and as days passed,
and the comets gradually faded out of sight, and then the dome of the
sky showed a tendency to resume its natural blueness, the enthusiasm of
Cosmo's imitators weakened, together with their confidence in his
prophetic powers.

They concluded to postpone their operations until the need of arks
should become more evident.

As to those who had sent inquiries about places in Cosmo's ark, now that
the danger seemed to be blowing away, they did not even take the trouble
to answer the very kind responses that he had made.

It is a singular circumstance that not one of these anxious inquirers
seemed to have paid particular attention to a very significant sentence
in his reply. If they had given it a little thought, it would probably
have set them pondering, although they might have been more puzzled than
edified. The sentence ran as follows:

"While assuring you that my ark has been built for the benefit of my
fellow men, I am bound to tell you that I reserve absolutely the right
to determine who are truly representative of _homo sapiens_."

The fact was that Cosmo had been turning over in his mind the great
fundamental question which he had asked himself when the idea of trying
to save the human race from annihilation had first occurred to him, and
apparently he had fixed upon certain principles that were to guide him.

Since, when the mind is under great strain through fear, the slightest
relaxation, caused by an apparently favorable change, produces a rebound
of hope, as unreasoning as the preceding terror, so, on this occasion,
the vanishing of the comets, and the fading of the disquieting color of
the sky, had a wonderful effect in restoring public confidence in the
orderly procession of nature.

Cosmo Versál's vogue as a prophet of disaster was soon gone, and once
more everybody began to laugh at him. People turned again to their
neglected affairs with the general remark that they "guessed the world
would manage to wade through."

Those who had begun preparations to build arks looked very sheepish when
their friends guyed them about their childish credulity.

Then a feeling of angry resentment arose, and one day Cosmo Versál was
mobbed in the street, and the gamins threw stones at him.

People forgot the extraordinary storm of lightning and rain, the split
comet, and all the other circumstances which, a little time before, had
filled them with terror.

But they were making a fearful mistake!

With eyes blindfolded they were walking straight into the jaws of
destruction.

Without warning, and as suddenly almost as an explosion, the _third
sign_ appeared, and on its heels came a veritable Reign of Terror!




CHAPTER V

THE THIRD SIGN


In the middle of the night, at New York, hundreds of thousands
simultaneously awoke with a feeling of suffocation.

They struggled for breath as if they had suddenly been plunged into a
steam bath.

The air was hot, heavy, and terribly oppressive.

The throwing open of windows brought no relief. The outer air was as
stifling as that within.

It was so dark that, on looking out, one could not see his own
doorsteps. The arc-lamps in the street flickered with an ineffective
blue gleam which shed no illumination round about.

House lights, when turned on, looked like tiny candles inclosed in thick
blue globes.

Frightened men and women stumbled around in the gloom of their chambers
trying to dress themselves.

Cries and exclamations rang from room to room; children wailed;
hysterical mothers ran wildly hither and thither, seeking their little
ones. Many fainted, partly through terror and partly from the difficulty
of breathing. Sick persons, seized with a terrible oppression of the
chest, gasped, and never rose from their beds.

At every window, and in every doorway, throughout the vast city,
invisible heads and forms were crowded, making their presence known by
their voices--distracted householders striving to peer through the
strange darkness, and to find out the cause of these terrifying
phenomena.

Some managed to get a faint glimpse of their watches by holding them
close against lamps, and thus noted the time. It was two o'clock in the
morning.

Neighbors, unseen, called to one another, but got little comfort from
the replies.

"What is it? In God's name, what has happened?"

"I don't know. I can hardly breathe."

"It is awful! We shall all be suffocated."

"Is it a fire?"

"No! No! It cannot be a fire."

"The air is full of steam. The stones and the window-panes are streaming
with moisture."

"Great Heavens, how stifling it is!"

Then, into thousands of minds at once leaped the thought of _the
flood!_

The memory of Cosmo Versál's reiterated warnings came back with
overwhelming force. It must be the _third sign_ that he had
foretold. _It had really come!_

Those fateful words--"the flood" and "Cosmo Versál"--ran from lip to
lip, and the hearts of those who spoke, and those who heard, sank like
lead in their bosoms.

He would be a bold man, more confident in his powers of description than
the present writer, who should attempt to picture the scenes in New York
on that fearful night.

The gasping and terror-stricken millions waited and longed for the hour
of sunrise, hoping that then the stygian darkness would be dissipated,
so that people might, at least, see where to go and what to do. Many,
oppressed by the almost unbreathable air, gave up in despair, and no
longer even hoped for morning to come.

In the midst of it all a collision occurred directly over Central Park
between two aero-expresses, one coming from Boston and the other from
Albany. (The use of small aeroplanes within the city limits had, for
some time, been prohibited on account of the constant danger of
collisions, but the long-distance lines were permitted to enter the
metropolitan district, making their landings and departures on specially
constructed towers.) These two, crowded with passengers, had, as it
afterward appeared, completely lost their bearings--the strongest
electric lights being invisible a few hundred feet away, while the
wireless signals were confusing--and, before the danger was apprehended,
they crashed together.

The collision occurred at a height of a thousand feet, on the Fifth
Avenue side of the park. Both of the airships had their aeroplanes
smashed and their decks crumpled up, and the unfortunate crews and
passengers were hurled through the impenetrable darkness to the ground.

Only four or five, who were lucky enough to be entangled with the
lighter parts of the wreckage, escaped with their lives. But they were
too much injured to get upon their feet, and there they lay, their
sufferings made tenfold worse by the stifling air, and the horror of
their inexplicable situation, until they were found and humanely
relieved, more than ten hours after their fall.

The noise of the collision had been heard in Fifth Avenue, and its
meaning was understood; but amid the universal terror no one thought of
trying to aid the victims. Everybody was absorbed in wondering what
would become of himself.

When the long attended hour of sunrise approached, the watchers were
appalled by the absence of even the slightest indication of the
reappearance of the orb of day. There was no lightening of the dense
cloak of darkness, and the great city seemed dead.

For the first time in its history it failed to awake after its regular
period of repose, and to send forth its myriad voices. It could not be
seen; it could not be heard; it made no sign. As far as any outward
indication of its existence was concerned the mighty capital had ceased
to be.

It was this frightful silence of the streets, and of all the outer
world, that terrified the people, cooped up in their houses, and their
rooms, by the walls of darkness, more than almost any other
circumstance; it gave such an overwhelming sense of the universality of
the disaster, whatever that disaster might be. Except where the voices
of neighbors could be heard, one could not be sure that the whole
population, outside his own family, had not perished.

As the hours passed, and yet no light appeared, another intimidating
circumstance manifested itself. From the start everybody had noticed the
excessive humidity of the dense air. Every solid object that the hands
came in contact with in the darkness was wet, as if a thick fog had
condensed upon it. This supersaturation of the air (a principal cause of
the difficulty experienced in breathing) led to a result which would
quickly have been foreseen if people could have had the use of their
eyes, but which, coming on invisibly, produced a panic fear when at last
its presence was strikingly forced upon the attention.

The moisture collected on all exposed surfaces--on the roofs, the walls,
the pavements--until its quantity became sufficient to form little
rills, which sought the gutters, and there gathered force and volume.
Presently the streams became large enough to create a noise of flowing
water that attracted the attention of the anxious watchers at the open
windows. Then cries of dismay arose. If the water had been visible it
would not have been terrible.

But, to the overstrained imagination, the bubbling and splashing sound
that came out of the darkness was magnified into the rush of a torrent.
It seemed to grow louder every moment. What was but a murmur on the
ear-drum became a roar in the excited brain-cells.

Once more were heard the ominous words, "The flood!"

They spread from room to room, and from house to house. The wild scenes
that had attended the first awakening were tame in comparison with what
now occurred. Self-control, reason--everything--gave way to panic.

If they could only have _seen_ what they were about!

But then they would not have been about it. Then their reason would not
have been dethroned.

Darkness is the microscope of the imagination, and it magnifies a
million times!

Some timorously descended their doorsteps, and feeling a current of
water in the gutter, recoiled with cries of horror, as if they had
slipped down the bank of a flooded river. As they retreated they
believed that the water was rising at their heels!

Others made their way to the roofs, persuaded that the flood was already
inundating the basements and the lower stories of their dwellings.

Women wrung their hands and wept, and children cried, and men pushed and
stumbled about, and shouted, and would have done something if only they
could have seen what to do. That was the pity of it! It was as if the
world had been stricken blind, and then the trump of an archangel had
sounded, crying:

"Fly! Fly! for the Avenger is on your heels!"

How could they fly?

This awful strain could not have lasted. It would have needed no deluge
to finish New York if that maddening pall of darkness had remained
unbroken a few hours longer. But, just when thousands had given up in
despair, there came a rapid change.

At the hour of noon light suddenly broke overhead. Beginning in a round
patch inclosed in an iridescent halo, it spread swiftly, seeming to melt
its way down through the thick, dark mass that choked the air, and in
less than fifteen minutes New York and all its surroundings emerged into
the golden light of noonday.

People who had expected at any moment to feel the water pitilessly
rising about them looked out of their windows, and were astonished to
see only tiny rivulets which were already shriveling out of sight in the
gutters. In a few minutes there was no running water left, although the
dampness on the walls and walks showed how great the humidity of the air
had been.

At the same time the oppression was lifted from the respiratory
apparatus, and everybody breathed freely once more, and felt courage
returning with each respiration.

The whole great city seemed to utter a vast sigh of relief.

And then its voice was heard, as it had never been heard before, rising
higher and louder every moment. It was the first time that morning had
ever broken at midday.

The streets became filled, with magical quickness, by hundreds of
thousands, who chattered, and shouted, and laughed, and shook hands, and
asked questions, and told their experiences, and demanded if anybody had
ever heard of such a thing before, and wondered what it could have been,
and what it meant, and whether it would come back again.

Telephones of all kinds were kept constantly busy. Women called up their
friends, and talked hysterically; men called up their associates and
partners, and tried to talk business.

There was a rush for the Elevated, for the Subways, for the street
auto-cars. The great arteries of traffic became jammed, and the noise
rose louder and louder.

Belated aero-expresses arrived at the towers from East and West, and
their passengers hurried down to join the excited multitudes below.

In an incredibly brief time the newsboys were out with extras. Then
everybody read with the utmost avidity what everybody knew already.

But before many hours passed there was real news, come by wireless, and
by submarine telephone and telegraph, telling how the whole world had
been swept by the marvelous cloak of darkness.

In Europe it had arrived during the morning hours; in Asia during the
afternoon.

The phenomena had varied in different places. In some the darkness had
not been complete, but everywhere it was accompanied by extraordinary
humidity, and occasionally by brief but torrential rains. The terror had
been universal, and all believed that it was the _third sign_
predicted by Cosmo Versál.

Of course, the latter was interviewed, and he gave out a characteristic
manifesto.

"One of the outlying spirals of the nebula has struck the earth," he
said. "But do not be deceived. It is nothing in comparison with what is
coming. _And it is the LAST WARNING that will be given!_ You have
obstinately shut your eyes to the truth, _and you have thrown away
your lives!_"

This, together with the recent awful experience, produced a great
effect. Those who had begun to lay foundations for arks thought of
resuming the work. Those who had before sought places with Cosmo called
him up by telephone. But only the voice of Joseph Smith answered, and
his words were not reassuring.

"Mr. Versál," he said, "directs me to say that at present he will allot
no places. He is considering whom he will take."

The recipients of this reply looked very blank. But at least one of
them, a well-known broker in Wall Street, was more angered than
frightened:

"Let him go to the deuce!" he growled; "him and his flood together!"

Then he resolutely set out to bull the market.

It seems incredible--but such is human nature--that a few days of bright
sunshine should once more have driven off the clouds of fear that had
settled so densely over the popular mind. Of course, not everybody
forgot the terrors of the _third sign_--they had struck too deep,
but gradually the strain was relaxed, and people in general accepted the
renewed assurances of the savants of the Pludder type that nothing that
had occurred was inexplicable by the ordinary laws of nature. The great
darkness, they averred, differed from previous occurrences of the kind
only in degree, and it was to be ascribed to nothing more serious than
atmospheric vagaries, such as that which produced the historic Dark Day
in New England in the year 1780.

But more nervous persons noticed, with certain misgivings, that Cosmo
Versál pushed on his operations, if possible more energetically than
before. And there was a stir of renewed interest when the announcement
came out one day that the ark was finished. Then thousands hurried to
Mineola to look upon the completed work.

The extraordinary massiveness of the ark was imposing. Towering
ominously on its platform, which was so arranged that when the waters
came they should lift the structure from its cradle and set it afloat
without any other launching, it seemed in itself a prophecy of impending
disaster.

Overhead it was roofed with an oblong dome of levium, through which rose
four great metallic chimneys, placed above the mighty engines. The roof
sloped down to the vertical sides, to afford protection from in-bursting
waves. Rows of portholes, covered with thick, stout glass, indicated the
location of the superposed decks. On each side four gangways gave access
to the interior, and long, sloping approaches offered means of entry
from the ground.

Cosmo had a force of trained guards on hand, but everybody who wished
was permitted to enter and inspect the ark. Curious multitudes
constantly mounted and descended the long approaches, being kept moving
by the guards.

Inside they wandered about astonished by what they saw.

The three lower decks were devoted to the storage of food and of fuel
for the electric generators which Cosmo Versál had been accumulating for
months.

Above these were two decks, which the visitors were informed would be
occupied by animals, and by boxes of seeds and prepared roots of plants,
with which it was intended to restore the vegetable life of the planet
after the water should have sufficiently receded.

The five remaining decks were for human beings. There were roomy
quarters for the commander and his officers, others for the crew,
several large saloons, and five hundred sets of apartments of various
sizes to be occupied by the passengers whom Cosmo should choose to
accompany him. They had all the convenience of the most luxurious
staterooms of the trans-oceanic liners. Many joking remarks were
exchanged by the visitors as they inspected these rooms.

Cosmo ran about among his guests, explaining everything, showing great
pride in his work, pointing out a thousand particulars in which his
foresight had been displayed--but, to everybody's astonishment, he
uttered no more warnings, and made no appeals. On the contrary, as some
observant persons noticed, he seemed to avoid any reference to the fate
of those who should not be included in his ship's company.

Some sensitive souls were disturbed by detecting in his eyes a look that
seemed to express deep pity and regret. Occasionally he would draw
apart, and gaze at the passing crowds with a compassionate expression,
and then, slowly turning his back, while his fingers worked nervously,
would disappear, with downcast head, in his private room.

The comparatively few who particularly noticed this conduct of Cosmo's
were deeply moved--more than they had been by all the enigmatic events
of the past months. One man, Amos Blank, a rich manufacturer, who was
notorious for the merciless methods that he had pursued in eliminating
his weaker competitors, was so much disturbed by Cosmo Versál's change
of manner that he sought an opportunity to speak to him privately. Cosmo
received him with a reluctance that he could not but notice, and which,
somehow, increased his anxiety.

"I--I--thought," said the billionaire hesitatingly, "that I ought--that
is to say, that I might, perhaps, inquire--might inform myself--under
what conditions one could, supposing the necessity to arise, obtain a
passage in your--in your ark. Of course the question of cost does not
enter in the matter--not with me."

Cosmo gazed at the man coldly, and all the compassion that had recently
softened his steely eyes disappeared. For a moment he did not speak.
Then he said, measuring his words and speaking with an emphasis that
chilled the heart of his listener:

"Mr. Blank, the necessity has arisen."

"So you say--so you say--" began Mr. Blank.

"So I say," interrupted Cosmo sternly, "and I say further that this ark
has been constructed to save those who are worthy of salvation, in order
that all that is good and admirable in humanity may not perish from the
earth."

"Exactly, exactly," responded the other, smiling, and rubbing his hands.
"You are quite right to make a proper choice. If your flood is going to
cause a general destruction of mankind, of course you are bound to
select the best, the most advanced, those who have pushed to the front,
those who have means, those with the strongest resources. The masses,
who possess none of these qualifications and claims--"

Again Cosmo Versál interrupted him, more coldly than before:

"It costs nothing to be a passenger in this ark. Ten million dollars, a
hundred millions, would not purchase a place in it! Did you ever hear
the parable of the camel and the needle's eye? The price of a ticket
here is an irreproachable record!"

With these astonishing words Cosmo turned his back upon his visitor and
shut the door in his face.

The billionaire staggered back, rubbed his head, and then went off
muttering:

"An idiot! A plain idiot! There will be no flood."




CHAPTER VI

SELECTING THE FLOWER OF MANKIND


After a day or two, during which the ark was left open for inspection,
and was visited by many thousands, Cosmo Versál announced that no more
visitors would be admitted. He placed sentinels at all entrances, and
began the construction of a shallow ditch, entirely inclosing the
grounds. Public curiosity was intensely excited by this singular
proceeding, especially when it became known that the workmen were
stringing copper wires the whole length of the ditch.

"What the deuce is he up to now?" was the question on everybody's lips.

But Cosmo and his employees gave evasive replies to all inquiries. A
great change had come about in Cosmo's treatment of the public. No one
was any longer encouraged to watch the operations.

When the wires were all placed and the ditch was finished, it was
covered up so that it made a broad flat-topped wall, encircling the
field.

Speculation was rife for several days concerning the purpose of the
mysterious ditch and its wires, but no universally satisfactory
explanation was found.

One enterprising reporter worked out an elaborate scheme, which he
ascribed to Cosmo Versál, according to which the wired ditch was to
serve as a cumulator of electricity, which would, at the proper moment,
launch the ark upon the waters, thus avoiding all danger of a fatal
detention in case the flood should rise too rapidly.

This seemed so absurd on its face that it went far to quiet apprehension
by reawakening doubts of Cosmo's sanity--the more especially since he
made no attempt to contradict the assertion that the scheme was his.

Nobody guessed what his real intention was; if people had guessed, it
might have been bad for their peace of mind.

The next move of Cosmo Versál was taken without any knowledge or
suspicion on the part of the public. He had now established himself in
his apartments in the ark, and was never seen in the city.

One evening, when all was quiet about the ark, night work being now
unnecessary, Cosmo and Joseph Smith sat facing one another at a square
table lighted by a shaded lamp. Smith had a pile of writing paper before
him, and was evidently prepared to take copious notes.

Cosmo's great brow was contracted with thought, and he leaned his cheek
upon his hand. It was clear that his meditations were troublesome. For
at least ten minutes he did not open his lips, and Smith watched him
anxiously. At last he said, speaking slowly:

"Joseph, this is the most trying problem that I have had to solve. The
success of all my work depends upon my not making a mistake now.

"The burden of responsibility that rests on my shoulders is such as no
mortal has ever borne. It is too great for human capacity--and yet how
can I cast it off?

"I am to decide who shall be saved! _I_, _I_ alone, _I_,
Cosmo Versál, hold in my hands the fate of a race numbering two thousand
million souls!--the fate of a planet which, without my intervention,
would become simply a vast tomb. It is for _me_ to say whether the
_genus homo_ shall be perpetuated, and in what form it shall be
perpetuated. Joseph, this is terrible! These are the functions of deity,
not of man."

Joseph Smith seemed no longer to breathe, so intense was his attention.
His eyes glowed under the dark brows, and his pencil trembled in his
fingers. After a slight pause Cosmo Versál went on:

"If I felt any doubt that Providence had foreordained me to do this
work, and given me extraordinary faculties, and extraordinary knowledge,
to enable me to perform it, I would, this instant, blow out my brains."

Again he was silent, the secretary, after fidgeting about, bending and
unbending his brows, and tapping nervously upon the table, at last said
solemnly:

"Cosmo, you _are_ ordained; you must _do the work._"

"I must," returned Cosmo Versál, "I know that; and yet the sense of my
responsibility sometimes covers me with a cloud of despair. The other
day, when the ark was crowded with curiosity seekers, the thought that
not one of all those tens of thousands could escape, and that hundreds
of millions of others must also be lost, overwhelmed me. Then I began to
reproach myself for not having been a more effective agent in warning my
fellows of their peril. Joseph, I have miserably failed. I ought to have
produced universal conviction that I was right, and I have not done it."

"It is not your fault, Cosmo," said Joseph Smith, reaching out his long
arm to touch his leader's hand. "It is an unbelieving generation. They
have rejected even the signs in the heavens. The voice of an archangel
would not have convinced them."

"It is true," replied Cosmo. "And the truth is the more bitter to me
because I spoke in the name of science, and the very men who represent
science have been my most determined opponents, blinding the people's
eyes--after willfully shutting their own."

"You say you have been weak," interposed Smith, "which you have not
been; but you would be weak if you now shrank from your plain duty."

"True!" cried Cosmo, in a changed voice. "Let us then proceed. I had a
lesson the other day. Amos Blank came to me, puffed with his pillaged
millions. I saw then what I had to do. I told him plainly that he was
not among the chosen. Hand me that book over there."

The secretary pushed a large volume within Cosmo's reach. He opened it.
It was a "Year-Book of Science, Politics, Sociology, History, and
Government."

Cosmo ran over its pages, stopping to read a few lines here and there,
seeming to make mental notes. After a while he pushed the book aside,
looked at his companion thoughtfully, and began:

"The trouble with the world is that morally and physically it has for
thousands of years grown more and more corrupt. The flower of
civilization, about which people boast so much, nods over the stagnant
waters of a moral swamp and draws its perilous beauty from the poisons
of the miasma.

"The nebula, in drowning the earth, brings opportunity for a new birth
of mankind. You will remember, Joseph, that the same conditions are said
to have prevailed in the time of Noah. There was no science then, and we
do not know exactly on what principles the choice was made of those who
should escape; but the simple history of Noah shows that he and his
friends represented the best manhood of that early age.

"But the seeds of corruption were not eliminated, and the same problem
recurs to-day.

"I have to determine whom I will save. I attack the question by
inquiring who represent the best elements of humanity? Let us first
consider men by classes."

"And why not by races?" asked Smith.

"I shall not look to see whether a man is black, white, or yellow;
whether his skull is brachycephalic or dolichocephalic," replied Cosmo.
"I shall look inside. No race has ever shown itself permanently the
best."

"Then by classes you mean occupations?"

"Well, yes, for the occupation shows the tendency, the quintessence of
character. Some men are born rulers and leaders; others are born
followers. Both are necessary, and I must have both kinds."

"You will begin perhaps with the kings, the presidents?"

"Not at all. I shall begin with the men of science. They are the true
leaders."

"But they have betrayed you--they have shut their eyes and blindfolded
others," objected Joseph Smith, as if in extenuation.

"You do not understand me," said Cosmo, with a commiserating smile. "If
my scientific brethren have not seen as clearly as I have done, the
fault lies not in science, but in lack of comprehension. Nevertheless,
they are on the right track; they have the gist of the matter in them;
they are trained in the right method. If I should leave them out, the
regenerated world would start a thousand years behind time. Besides,
many of them are not so blind; some of them have got a glimpse of the
truth."

"Not such men as Pludder," said Smith.

"All the same, I am going to save Pludder," said Cosmo Versál.

Joseph Smith fairly jumped with astonishment.

"You--are--going--to--save--Pludder," he faltered. "But he is the worst
of all."

"Not from my present view-point. Pludder has a good brain; he can handle
the tools; he is intellectually honest; he has done great things for
science in the past. And, besides, I do not conceal from you the fact
that I should like to see him convicted out of his own mouth."

"But," persisted Smith, "I have heard you say that he was--"

"No matter what you have heard me say," interrupted Cosmo impatiently.
"I say now that he shall go with us. Put down his name at the head of
the list."

Dumfounded and muttering under his breath, Smith obeyed.

"I can take exactly one thousand individuals, exclusive of the crew,"
continued Versál, paying no attention to his confidant's repeated
shaking of his head. "Good Heavens, think of that! One thousand out of
two thousand millions! But so be it. Nobody would listen to me, and now
it is too late. I must fix the number for each class."

"There is one thing--one curious question--that occurs to me," put in
Smith hesitatingly. "What about families?"

"There you've hit it," cried Cosmo. "That's exactly what bothers me.
There must be as many women as men--that goes without saying. Then, too,
the strongest moral element is in the women, although they don't weigh
heavily for science. But the aged people and the children--there's the
difficulty. If I invite a man who possesses unquestionable
qualifications, but has a large family, what am I to do? I can't crowd
out others as desirable as he for the sake of carrying all of his
stirpes. The principles of eugenics demand a wide field of selection."

Cosmo Versál covered his eyes, rested his big head on his hands, and his
elbows on the table. Presently he looked up with an air of decision.

"I see what I must do," he said. "I can take only four persons belonging
to any one family. Two of them may be children--a man, his wife, and two
children--no more."

"But that will be very hard lines for them--" began Joseph Smith.

"Hard lines!" Cosmo broke in. "Do you think it is easy lines for me?
Good Heavens, man! I am forced to this decision. It rends my heart to
think of it, but I can't avoid the responsibility."

Smith dropped his eyes, and Cosmo resumed his reflections. In a little
while he spoke again:

"Another thing that I must fix is an age limit. But that will have to be
subject to certain exceptions. Very aged persons in general will not
do--they could not survive the long voyage, and only in the rare
instances where their experience of life might be valuable would they
serve any good purpose in reëstablishing the race. Children are
indispensable--but they must not be too young--infants in arms would not
do at all. Oh, this is sorry work! But I must harden my heart."

Joseph Smith looked at his chief, and felt a twinge of sympathy,
tempered by admiration, for he saw clearly the terrible contest in his
friend's mind and appreciated the heroic nature of the decision to which
the inexorable logic of facts had driven it.

Cosmo Versál was again silent for a long time. Finally he appeared to
throw off the incubus, and, with a return of his ordinary decisiveness,
exclaimed:

"Enough. I have settled the general principle. Now to the choice."

Then, closing his eyes, as if to assist his memory, he ran over a list
of names well known in the world of science, and Smith set them down in
a long row under the name of "Abiel Pludder," with which he had begun.

At last Cosmo Versál ceased his dictation.

"There," he said, "that is the end of that category. I may add to or
subtract from it later. According to probability, making allowance for
bachelors, each name will represent three persons; there are
seventy-five names, which means two hundred and twenty-five places
reserved for science. I will now make a series of other categories and
assign the number of places for each."

He seized a sheet of paper and fell to work, while Smith looked on,
drumming with his fingers and contorting his huge black eyebrows. For
half an hour complete silence reigned, broken only by the gliding sound
of Cosmo Versál's pencil, occasionally emphasized by a soft thump. At
the end of that time he threw down the pencil and held out the paper to
his companion.

"Of course," he said, "this is not a complete list of human occupations.
I have set down the principal ones as they occurred to me. There will be
time to correct any oversight. Read it."

Smith, by force of habit, read it aloud:

                               No. of    Probable No.
Occupation                     Names      of Places

Science (already assigned)      75           225
Rulers                          15            45
Statesmen                       10            30
Business magnates               10            30
Philanthropists                  5            15
Artists                         15            45
Religious teachers              20            60
School-teachers                 20            60
Doctors                         30            90
Lawyers                          1             3
Writers                          6            18
Editors                          2             6
Players                         14            42
Philosophers                     1             3
Musicians                       12            36
Speculative geniuses             3             9
"Society"                        0             0
Agriculture and mechanics       90           270
                              ____          ____
            Totals             329           987
Special reservations                          13
                                            ____
            Grand total, places             1000

Several times while Joseph Smith was reading he raised his eyebrows, as
if in surprise or mental protest, but made no remark.

"Now," resumed Cosmo when the secretary had finished, "let us begin with
the rulers. I do not know them as intimately as I know the men of
science, but I am sure I have given them places enough. Suppose you take
this book and call them over to me."

Smith opened the "year-book," and began:

"George Washington Samson, President of the United States."

"He goes. He is not intellectually brilliant, but he has strong sense
and good moral fiber. I'll save him if for no other reason than his veto
of the Antarctic Continent grab bill."

"Shen Su, Son of Heaven, President-Emperor of China."

"Put him down. I like him. He is a true Confucian."

Joseph Smith read off several other names at which Cosmo shook his head.
Then he came to:

"Richard Edward, by the grace of God, King of Great--"

"Enough," broke in Cosmo; "we all know him--the man who has done more
for peace by putting half the British navy out of commission than any
other ruler in history. I can't leave him out."

"Achille Dumont, President of the French republic."

"I'll take him."

"William IV, German Emperor."

"Admitted, for he has at last got the war microbe out of the family
blood."

Then followed a number of rulers who were not lucky enough to meet with
Cosmo Versál's approval, and when Smith read:

"Alexander V, Emperor of all the Russias," the big head was violently
shaken, and its owner exclaimed:

"There will be many Russians in the ark, for tyranny has been like a
lustration to that people; but I will carry none of its Romanoff seeds
to my new world."

The selection was continued until fifteen names had been obtained,
including that of the new, dark-skinned President of Liberia, and Cosmo
declared that he would not add another one.

Then came the ten statesmen who were chosen with utter disregard to
racial and national lines.

In selecting his ten business magnates, Cosmo stated his rule:

"I exclude no man simply because he is a billionaire. I consider the way
he made his money. The world must always have rich men. How could I have
built the ark if I had been poor?"

"Philanthropists," read Smith.

"I should have taken a hundred if I could have found them," said Cosmo.
"There are plenty of candidates, but these five [naming them] are the
only genuine ones, and I am doubtful about several of them. But I must
run some chances, philanthropy being indispensable."

For the fifteen representatives of art Cosmo confined his selection
largely to architecture.

"The building instinct must be preserved," he explained. "One of the
first things we shall need after the flood recedes is a variety of all
kinds of structures. But it's a pretty bad lot at the best. I shall try
to reform their ideas during the voyage. As to the other artists, they,
too, will need some hints that I can give them, and that they can
transmit to their children."

Under the head of religious teachers, Cosmo remarked that he had tried
to be fair to all forms of genuine faith that had a large following. The
school-teachers represented the principal languages, and Cosmo selected
the names from a volume on "The Educational Systems of the World,"
remarking that he ran some risk here, but it could not easily be
avoided.

"Doctors--they get a rather liberal allowance, don't they?" asked Smith.

"Not half as large as I'd like to have it," was the response. "The
doctors are the salt of the earth. It breaks my heart to have to leave
out so many whose worth I know."

"And only one lawyer!" pursued Joseph. "That's curious."

"Not in the least curious. Do you think I want to scatter broadcast the
seeds of litigation in a regenerated world? Put down the name of Chief
Justice Good of the United States Supreme Court. He'll see that equity
prevails."

"And only six writers," continued Smith.

"And that's probably too many," said Cosmo. "Set down under that head
Peter Inkson, whom I will engage to record the last scenes on the
drowning earth; James Henry Blackwitt, who will tell the story of the
voyage; Jules Bourgeois, who can describe the personnel of the
passengers; Sergius Narishkoff, who will make a study of their
psychology; and Nicolao Ludolfo, whose description of the ark will be an
invaluable historic document a thousand years hence."

"But you have included no poets," remarked Smith.

"Not necessary," responded Cosmo. "Every human being is a poet at
bottom."

"And no novelists," persisted the secretary.

"They will spring up thicker than weeds before the waters are half
gone--at least, they would if I let one aboard the ark."

"Editors--two?"

"That's right. And two too many, perhaps. I'll take Jinks of the
_Thunderer_, and Bullock of the _Owl._"

"But both of them have persistently called you an idiot."

"For that reason I want them. No world could get along without some real
idiots."

"I am rather surprised at the next entry, if you will permit me to speak
of it," said Joseph Smith. "Here you have forty-two places reserved for
players."

"That means twenty-eight adults, and probably some youngsters who will
be able to take parts," returned Cosmo, rubbing his hands with a
satisfied smile. "I have taken as many players as I conscientiously
could, not only because of their future value, but because they will do
more than anything else to keep up the spirits of everybody in the ark.
I shall have a stage set in the largest saloon."

Joseph Smith scowled, but held his peace. Then, glancing again at the
paper, he remarked that there was but one philosopher to be provided
for.

"It is easy to name him," said Cosmo. "Kant Jacobi Leergeschwätz."

"Why he?"

"Because he will harmlessly represent the metaphysical _genus_, for
nobody will ever understand him."

"Musicians twelve?"

"Chosen for the same reason as the players," said Cosmo, rapidly writing
down twelve names because they were not easy to pronounce, and handing
them to Smith, who duly copied them off.

When this was done Cosmo himself called out the next
category--"'speculative geniuses.'"

"I mean by that," he continued, "not Wall Street speculators, but
foreseeing men who possess the gift of looking into the 'seeds of time,'
but who never get a hearing in their own day, and are hardly ever
remembered by the future ages which enjoy the fruits whose buds they
recognized."

Cosmo mentioned two names which Joseph Smith had never heard, and told
him they ought to be written in golden ink.

"They are _sui generis_, and alone in the world. They are the most
precious cargo I shall have aboard," he added.

Smith shrugged his shoulders and stared blankly at the paper, while
Cosmo sank into a reverie. Finally the secretary said, smiling with
evident approval this time:

"'Society' zero."

"Precisely, for what does 'society' represent except its own vanity?"

"And then comes agriculture and mechanics."

For this category Cosmo seemed to be quite as well prepared as for that
of science. He took from his pocket a list already made out and handed
it to Joseph Smith. It contained forty names marked "cultivators,
farmers, gardeners," and fifty "mechanics."

"At the beginning of the twentieth century," he said, "I should have had
to reverse that proportion--in fact, my entire list would then have been
top-heavy, and I should have been forced to give half of all the places
to agriculture. But thanks to our scientific farming, the personnel
employed in cultivation is now reduced to a minimum while showing
maximum results. I have already stored the ark with seeds of the latest
scientifically developed plants, and with all the needed agricultural
implements and machinery."

"There yet remain thirteen places 'specially reserved,'" said Smith,
referring to the paper.

"I shall fill those later," responded Cosmo, and then added with a
thoughtful look, "I have some humble friends."

"The next thing," he continued, after a pause, "is to prepare the
letters of invitation. But we have done enough for to-night. I will give
you the form to-morrow."

And all this while half the world had been peacefully sleeping, and the
other half going about its business, more and more forgetful of recent
events, and if it had known what those two men were about it would
probably have exploded in a gust of laughter.




CHAPTER VII

THE WATERS BEGIN TO RISE


Cosmo Versál had begun the construction of his ark in the latter part of
June. It was now the end of November. The terrors of the _third
sign_ had occurred in September. Since then the sky had nearly
resumed its normal color, there had been no storms, but the heat of
summer had not relaxed. People were puzzled by the absence of the usual
indications of autumn, although vegetation had shriveled on account of
the persistent high temperature and constant sunshine.

"An extraordinary year," admitted the meteorologists, "but there have
been warm falls before, and it is simply a question of degree. Nature
will restore the balance and in good time, and probably we shall have a
severe winter."

On the 31st of November, the brassy sky at New York showed no signs of
change, when the following dispatch, which most of the newspapers
triple-leaded and capped with stunning headlines, quivered down from
Churchill, Keewatin:

    During last night the level of the water in Hudson Bay rose
    fully nine feet. Consternation reigned this morning when
    ship-owners found their wharves inundated, and vessels straining
    at short cables. The ice-breaker "Victoria" was lifted on the
    back of a sandy bar, having apparently been driven by a heavy
    wave, which must have come from the East. There are other
    indications that the mysterious rise began with a "bore" from
    the eastward. It is thought that the vast mass of icebergs set
    afloat on Davis's Strait by the long continued hot weather
    melting the shore glaciers, has caused a jam off the mouth of
    Hudson Strait, and turned the Polar current suddenly into the
    bay. But this is only a theory. A further rise is anticipated.

Startling as was this news, it might not, by itself, have greatly
disturbed the public mind if it had not been followed, in a few hours,
by intelligence of immense floods in Alaska and in the basin of the
Mackenzie River.

And the next day an etherogram from Obdorsk bordered on the grotesque,
and filled many sensitive readers with horror.

It is said that in the vast tundra regions of Northern Siberia the
frozen soil had dissolved into a bottomless slough, from whose depths
uprose prehistoric mammoths, their long hair matted with mud, and their
curved tusks of ivory gleaming like trumpets over the field of their
resurrection. The dispatch concluded with a heart-rending account of the
loss of a large party of ivory hunters, who, having ventured too far
from the more solid land, suddenly found the ground turning to black
ooze beneath their feet, and, despite their struggles, were all engulfed
within sight of their friends, who dared not try to approach them.

Cosmo Versál, when interviewed, calmly remarked that the flood was
beginning in the north, because it was the northern part of the globe
that was nearest the heart of the nebula. The motion of the earth being
northward, that end of its axis resembled the prow of a ship.

"But this," he added, "is not the true deluge. The Arctic ice-cap is
melting, and the frozen soil is turning into a sponge in consequence of
the heat of friction developed in the air by the inrush of nebulous
matter. The aqueous vapor, however, has not yet touched the earth. It
will begin to manifest its presence within a few days, and then the
globe will drink water at every pore. The vapor will finally condense
into falling oceans."

"What would you advise people to do?" asked one of the reporters.

The reply was given in a perfectly even voice, without change of
countenance:

"_Commit suicide_! They have practically done that already."

It was nearly two weeks later when the first signs of a change of
weather were manifested in middle latitudes. It came on with a rapid
veiling of the sky, followed by a thin, misty, persistent rain. The heat
grew more oppressive, but the rain did not become heavier, and after a
few days there would be, for several consecutive hours, a clear spell,
during which the sun would shine, though with a sickly, pallid light.

There was a great deal of mystification abroad, and nobody felt at ease.
Still, the ebullitions of terror that had accompanied the earlier
caprices of the elements were not renewed. People were getting used to
these freaks.

In the middle of one of the clear spells a remarkable scene occurred at
Mineola.

It was like a panorama of the seventh chapter of Genesis.

It was the procession of the beasts.

Cosmo Versál had concluded that the time was come for housing his
animals in the ark. He wished to accustom them to their quarters before
the voyage began. The resulting spectacle filled the juvenile world with
irrepressible joy, and immensely interested their elders.

No march of a menagerie had ever come within sight of equaling this
display. Many of the beasts were such as no one there had ever seen
before. Cosmo had consulted experts, but, in the end, he had been guided
in his choice by his own judgment. Nobody knew as well as he exactly
what was wanted. He had developed in his mind a scheme for making the
new world that was to emerge from the waters better in every respect
than the old one.

Mingled with such familiar creatures as sheep, cows, dogs, and barn-yard
fowls, were animals of the past, which the majority of the onlookers had
only read about or seen pictures of, or perhaps, in a few cases, heard
described in childhood, by grandfathers long since sleeping in their
graves.

Cosmo had rapidly collected them from all parts of the world, but as
they arrived in small consignments, and were carried in closed vans,
very few persons had any idea of what he was doing.

The greatest sensation was produced by four beautiful horses, which had
been purchased at an enormous price from an English duke, who never
would have parted with them--for they were almost the last living
representatives of the equine race left on the earth--if financial
stress had not compelled the sacrifice.

These splendid animals were dapple gray, with long white tails, and
flowing manes borne proudly on their arching necks, and as they were led
at the head of the procession, snorting at the unwonted scene about
them, their eyes bright with excitement, prancing and curvetting, cries
of admiration and rounds of applause broke from the constantly growing
throngs of spectators.

Those who had only known the horse from pictures and sculptures were
filled with astonishment by its living beauty. People could not help
saying to themselves:

"What a pity that the honking auto, in its hundred forms of mechanical
ugliness, should have driven these beautiful and powerful creatures out
of the world! What could our forefathers have been thinking of?"

A few elephants, collected from African zoölogical gardens, and some
giraffes, also attracted a great deal of attention, but the horses were
the favorites with the crowd.

Cosmo might have had lions and tigers, and similar beasts, which had
been preserved, in larger numbers than the useful horse, but when Joseph
Smith suggested their inclusion he shook his head, declaring that it was
better that they should perish. As far as possible, he averred, he would
eliminate all carnivores.

In some respects, even more interesting to the onlookers than the
animals of the past, were the animals of the future that marched in the
procession. Few of them had ever been seen outside the experimental
stations where they had been undergoing the process of artificial
evolution.

There were the stately white Californian cattle, without horns, but of
gigantic stature, the cows, it was said, being capable of producing
twenty times more milk than their ancestral species, and of a vastly
superior quality.

There were the Australian rabbits, as large as Newfoundland dogs, though
short-legged, and furnishing food of the most exquisite flavor; and the
Argentine sheep, great balls of snowy wool, moving smartly along on legs
three feet in length.

The greatest astonishment was excited by the "grand astoria terrapin," a
developed species of diamond-back tortoise, whose exquisitely sculptured
convex back, lurching awkwardly as it crawled, rose almost three feet
above the ground; and the "new century turkey," which carried its beacon
head and staring eyes as high as a tall man's hat.

The end of the procession was formed of animals familiar to everybody,
and among them were cages of monkeys (concerning whose educational
development Cosmo Versál had theories of his own) and a large variety of
birds, together with boxes of insect eggs and chrysalids.

The delight of the boys who had chased after the procession culminated
when the animals began to ascend the sloping ways into the ark.

The horses shied and danced, making the metallic flooring resound like a
rattle of thunder; the elephants trumpeted; the sheep baaed and crowded
themselves into inextricable masses against the guard-rails; the huge
new cattle moved lumberingly up the slope, turning their big white heads
inquiringly about; the tall turkeys stretched their red coral necks and
gobbled with Brobdingnagian voices; and the great terrapins were
ignominiously attached to cables and drawn up the side of the ark,
helplessly waving their immense flappers in the air.

And when the sensational entry was finished, the satisfied crowd turned
away, laughing, joking, chattering, with never a thought that it was
anything more than the most amusing exhibition they had ever seen!

But when they got back in the city streets they met a flying squadron of
yelling newsboys, and seizing the papers from their hands read, in big
black letters:

  "AWFUL FLOOD IN THE MISSISSIPPI!

  "Thousands of People Drowned!

  "THE STORM COMING THIS WAY!"

It was a startling commentary on the recent scene at the ark, and many
turned pale as they read.

But the storm did not come in the way expected. The deluging rains
appeared to be confined to the Middle West and the Northwest, while at
New York the sky simply grew thicker and seemed to squeeze out moisture
in the form of watery dust. This condition lasted for some time, and
then came what everybody, even the most skeptical, had been secretly
dreading.

The ocean began to rise!

The first perception of this startling fact, according to a newspaper
account, came in a very strange, roundabout way to a man living on the
outskirts of the vast area of made ground where the great city had
spread over what was formerly the Newark meadows and Newark Bay.

About three o'clock in the morning, this man, who it appears was a
policeman off duty, was awakened by scurrying sounds in the house. He
struck a light, and seeing dark forms issuing from the cellar, went down
to investigate. The ominous gleam of water, reflecting the light of his
lamp, told him that the cellar was inundated almost to the top of the
walls.

"Come down here, Annie!" he shouted to his wife. "Sure 'tis Cosmo Versál
is invadin' the cellar with his flood. The rats are lavin' us."

Seeing that the slight foundation walls were crumbling, he hurried his
family into the street, and not too soon, for within ten minutes the
house was in ruins.

Neighbors, living in equally frail structures, were awakened, and soon
other undermined houses fell. Terror spread through the quarter, and
gradually half the city was aroused.

When day broke, residents along the water-front in Manhattan found their
cellars flooded, and South and West Streets swimming with water, which
was continually rising. It was noted that the hour was that of
flood-tide, but nobody had ever heard of a tide so high as this.

Alarm deepened into terror when the time for the tide to ebb arrived and
there was no ebbing. On the contrary, the water continued to rise. The
government observer at the Highlands telephoned that Sandy Hook was
submerged. Soon it was known that Coney Island, Rockaway, and all the
seaside places along the south shore of Long Island were under water.
The mighty current poured in through the Narrows with the velocity of a
mill-race. The Hudson, set backward on its course, rushed northward with
a raging bore at its head that swelled higher until it licked the feet
of the rock chimneys of the Palisades.

But when the terror inspired by this sudden invasion from the sea was at
its height there came unexpected relief. The water began to fall more
rapidly than it had risen. It rushed out through the Narrows faster than
it had rushed in, and ships, dragged from their anchorage in the upper
harbor, were carried out seaward, some being stranded on the sandbanks
and shoals in the lower bay.

Now again houses standing on made ground, whose foundations had been
undermined, fell with a crash, and many were buried in the ruins.

Notwithstanding the immense damage and loss of life, the recession of
the waters immediately had a reassuring effect, and the public, in
general, was disposed to be comforted by the explanation of the weather
officials, who declared that what had occurred was nothing more than an
unprecedentedly high tide, probably resulting from some unforeseen
disturbance out at sea.

The phenomenon had been noted all along the Atlantic coast. The chief
forecaster ventured the assertion that a volcanic eruption had occurred
somewhere on the line from Halifax to Bermuda. He thought that the
probable location of the upheaval had been at Munn's Reef, about halfway
between those points, and the more he discussed his theory the readier
he became to stake his reputation on its correctness, for, he said, it
was impossible that any combination of the effects of high and low
pressures could have created such a surge of the ocean, while a volcanic
wave, combining with the regular oscillation of the tide, could have
done it easily.

But Cosmo Versál smiled at this explanation, and said in reply:

"The whole Arctic ice-cap is dissolved, and the condensation of the
nebula is at hand. But there is worse behind. When the wave comes back
it will rise higher."

As the time for the next flood-tide grew near, anxious eyes were on the
watch to see how high the water would go. There was something in the
mere manner of its approach that made the nerves tingle.

It speeded toward the beaches, combing into rollers at an unwonted
distance from shore; plunged with savage violence upon the sands of the
shallows, as if it would annihilate them; and then, spreading swiftly,
ran with terrific speed up the strand, seeming to devour everything it
touched. After each recoil it sprang higher and roared louder and grew
blacker with the mud that it had ground up from the bottom. Miles inland
the ground trembled with the fast-repeated shocks.

Again the Hudson was hurled backward until a huge bore of water burst
over the wharves at Albany. Every foot of ground in New York less than
twenty feet above the mean high tide level was inundated. The
destruction was enormous, incalculable. Ocean liners moored along the
wharves were, in some cases, lifted above the level of the neighboring
streets, and sent crashing into the buildings along the water-front.

Etherograms told, in broken sentences, of similar experiences on the
western coasts of Europe, and from the Pacific came the news of the
flooding of San Francisco, Los Angeles, Portland, Tacoma, Seattle, and,
in fact, every coast-lying town. On the western coast of South America
the incoming waves broke among the foothills of the Andes.

It was as if the mighty basins of the world's two greatest oceans were
being rocked to and fro, sending the waters spinning from side to side.

And to add to the horror of the situation, every volcano on the globe
seemed to burst simultaneously into activity, probably through the
effects of the invasion of sea water into the subterranean fire, while
the strain of the unwonted weight thrown upon the coasts broke open the
tectonic lines of weakness in the earth's crust, causing the most
terrible earthquakes, which destroyed much that the water could not
reach.

From Alaska to Patagonia, from Kamchatka through Japan to the East
Indies, from Mount Hecla to Vesuvius, Etna, and Teneriffe, the raging
oceans were bordered with pouring clouds of volcanic smoke, hurled
upward in swift succeeding puffs, as if every crater had become the
stack of a stupendous steam-engine driven at its maddest speed; while
immense rivers of lava flamed down the mountain flanks and plunged into
the invading waters with reverberated roarings, hissings, and explosions
that seemed to shake the framework of the globe.

During the second awful shoreward heave of the Atlantic a scene occurred
off New York Bay that made the stoutest nerves quiver. A great crowd had
collected on the Highlands of the Navesink to watch the ingress of the
tidal wave.

Suddenly, afar off, the smoke of an approaching ocean liner was seen. It
needed but a glance to show that she was struggling with tremendous
surges. Sometimes she sank completely out of sight; then she reappeared,
riding high on the waves. Those who had glasses recognized her. Word ran
from mouth to mouth that it was the great _Atlantis_, the mightiest
of the ocean monarchs, of a hundred thousand tons register, coming from
Europe, and bearing, without question, many thousands of souls.

She was flying signals of distress, and filling the ether with her
inarticulate calls for help, which quavered into every radiograph
station within a radius of hundreds of miles.

But, at the same time, she was battling nobly for herself and for the
lives of her passengers and crew. From her main peak the Stars and
Stripes streamed in the tearing wind. There were many in the watching
throngs who personally knew her commander, Captain Basil Brown, and who
felt that if any human being could bring the laboring ship through
safely, he could. Aid from land was not to be thought of for a moment.

As she swiftly drew nearer, hurled onward by the resistless surges with
the speed of an express train, the captain was recognized on his bridge,
balancing himself amid the lurches of the vessel; and even at that
distance, and in those terrible circumstances, there was something in
his bearing perceptible to those who breathlessly watched him, through
powerful glasses, which spoke of perfect self-command, entire absence of
fear, and iron determination to save his ship or die with her under his
feet.

It could be seen that he was issuing orders and watching their
execution, but precisely what their nature was, of course, could only be
guessed. His sole hope must be to keep the vessel from being cast
ashore. There was no danger from the shoals, for they were by this time
deeply covered by the swelling of the sea.

Slowly, slowly, with a terrific straining of mechanic energies, which
pressed the jaws of the watchers together with spasmodic sympathy, as if
their own nervous power were cooperating in the struggle, the gallant
ship bore her head round to face the driving waves. From the ten huge,
red stacks columns of inky black smoke poured out as the stokers crammed
the furnaces beneath. It was man against nature, human nerve and
mechanical science against blind force.

It began to look as if the _Atlantis_ would win the battle. She was
now fearfully close to the shore, but her bow had been turned into the
very eye of the sea, and one could almost feel the tension of her steel
muscles as she seemed to spring to the encounter. The billows that split
themselves in quick succession on her sharp stem burst into shooting
geysers three hundred feet high.

The hearts of the spectators almost ceased to beat. Their souls were
wrapped up with the fate of the brave ship. They forgot the terrors of
their own situation, the peril of the coming flood, and saw nothing but
the agonized struggle before their eyes. With all their inward strength
they prayed against the ocean.

Such a contest could not last long. Suddenly, as the _Atlantis_
swerved a little aside, a surge that towered above her loftiest deck
rushed upon her. She was lifted like a cockleshell upon its crest, her
huge hull spun around, and the next minute, with a crash that resounded
above the roar of the maddened sea, she was dashed in pieces.

At the very last moment before the vessel disappeared in the whirling
breakers, to be strewed in broken and twisted bits of battered metal
upon the pounding sands, Captain Basil Brown was seen on the commander's
bridge.

No sooner had this tragedy passed than the pent-up terror broke forth,
and men ran for their lives, ran for their homes, ran to _do
something_--something, but what?--to save themselves and their dear
ones.

For now, at last, they _believed!_




CHAPTER VIII

STORMING THE ARK


There was to be no more respite now. The time of warnings was past. The
"signs" had all been shown to a skeptical and vacillating world, and at
last the fulfillment was at hand.

There was no crying of "extras" in the streets, for men had something
more pressing to think of than sending and reading news about their
distresses and those of their fellow-men. Many of the newspapers ceased
publication; every business place was abandoned; there was no thought
but of the means of escape.

But how should they escape? And whither should they fly?

The lower lying streets were under water. The Atlantic still surged back
and forth as if the ocean itself were in agony. And every time the waves
poured in they rose higher. The new shores of the bay, and the new
coasts of Long Island and New Jersey, receding inward hour by hour, were
strewn with the wrecks of hundreds of vessel of all kinds which had been
caught by the surges and pitilessly hurled to destruction.

Even if men did not yet fully believe in Cosmo Versál's theory of a
whelming nebula, they were terrified to the bottom of their souls by the
conviction, which nobody could resist, that the vast ice-fields of the
north, the glaciers of Greenland, the icy mountains of Alaska, had
melted away under the terrible downpour of heat, and were swelling the
oceans over their brims. And then a greater fear dropped like a blanket
upon them. Some one thought of the _antarctic ice._

The latest dispatches that had come, before the cessation of all
communication to the newspapers, had told of the prevalence of stifling
heat throughout the southern hemisphere, and of the vast fleets of
antarctic icebergs that filled the south seas. The mighty deposits of
ice, towering to mountain heights, that stretched a thousand miles in
every direction around the south pole were melting as the arctic ice had
melted, and, when the water thus formed was added to the already
overflowing seas, to what elevation might not the flood attain!

The antarctic ice was known to be the principal mass of frozen water on
the globe. The frigid cap of the north was nothing in comparison with
it. It had long been believed that that tremendous accumulation
unbalanced the globe and was the principal cause of the unsteadiness of
the earth's axis of rotation.

Every fresh exploration had only served to magnify the conception of the
incredible vastness of that deposit. The skirts of the Antarctic
Continent had proved to be rich in minerals wherever the rocks could
find a place to penetrate through the gigantic burden of ice, and the
principal nations had quarreled over the possession or control of these
protruding bits of wealth-crammed strata. But behind the bordering
cliffs of ice, rising in places a thousand feet above the level of the
sea, and towering farther inland so high that this region was, in mean
elevation, the loftiest on the planet, nothing but ice could be seen.

And now that ice was dissolving and flowing into the swollen oceans,
adding billions of tons of water every minute!

Men did not stop to calculate, as Cosmo Versál had done, just how much
the dissolution of all the ice and permanent snow of the globe would add
to the volume of the seas. He knew that it would be but a drop in the
bucket--although sufficient to start the flood--and that the great thing
to be feared was the condensation of the aqueous nebula, already
beginning to enwrap the planet in its stifling folds.

The public could understand the melting ice, although it could not fully
understand the nebula; it could understand the swelling sea, and the
raging rivers, and the lakes breaking over their banks--and the terror
and despair became universal.

But what should they _do?_

Those who had thought of building arks hurried to see if the work might
not yet be completed, but most of them had begun their foundations on
low land, which was already submerged.

Then a cry arose, terrible in its significance and in its
consequences--one of those cries that the vanished but unconquerable god
Pan occasionally sets ringing, nobody can tell how:

"Cosmo's ark! Get aboard! Storm it!"

And thereupon there was a mighty rush for Mineola. Nobody who caught the
infection stopped to reason. Some of them had to wade through water,
which in places was knee-deep. They came from various directions, and
united in a yelling mob. They meant to carry the ark with a rush. They
would not be denied. As the excited throngs neared the great vessel they
saw its huge form rising like a mount of safety, with an American flag
flapping over it, and they broke into a mighty cheer. On they sped,
seized with the unreason of a crowd, shouting, falling over one another,
struggling, fighting for places, men dragging their wives and children
through the awful crush, many trampled helpless under the myriads of
struggling feet--driving the last traces of sanity from one another's
minds.

The foremost ranks presently spied Cosmo Versál, watching them from an
open gangway sixty feet above their heads. They were dismayed at finding
the approaches gone. How should they get into the ark? How could they
climb up its vertical sides?

But they would find means. They would re-erect the approaches. They
would _get in somehow_.

Cosmo waved them off with frantic gesticulations; then, through a
trumpet, he shouted in a voice audible above the din:

"Keep back, for your lives!"

But they paid no attention to him; they rushed upon the raised wall,
surrounding the field where Cosmo had buried his mysterious lines of
wire. Then the meaning of that enigmatical work was flashed upon them.

As the first to arrive laid their hands upon the top of the low wall
they fell as if shot through the brain, tumbling backward on those
behind. Others pushed wildly on, but the instant they touched the wall
they too collapsed. Wicked blue-green sparks occasionally flashed above
the struggling mass.

The explanation was clear. Cosmo, foreseeing the probability of a
despairing attack, had surrounded the ark with an impassable electric
barrier. The sound of a whirring dynamo could be heard. A tremendous
current was flowing through the hidden wires and transmitting its
paralyzing energy to the metallic crest of the wall.

Still those behind pushed on, until rank after rank had sunk helpless at
the impregnable line of defense. They were not killed--at least, not
many--but the shock was so paralyzing that those who had experienced its
effects made no further attempts to cross the barrier. Many lay for a
time helpless upon the sodden ground.

Cosmo and Joseph Smith, who had now appeared at his side, continued to
shout warnings, which began to be heeded when the nature of the obstacle
became known. The rush was stopped, and the multitude stood at bay,
dazed, and uncertain what to do. Then a murmur arose, growing louder and
more angry and threatening, until suddenly a shot was heard in the midst
of the crowd, and Cosmo was seen to start backward, while Joseph Smith
instantly dodged out of sight.

A cry arose:

"Shoot him! That's right! Shoot the devil! He's a witch! He's drowning
the world!"

They meant it--at least, half of them did. It was the logic of terror.

Hundreds of shots were now fired from all quarters, and heads that had
been seen flitting behind the various portholes instantly disappeared.
The bullets rattled on the huge sides of the ark, but they came from
small pistols and had not force enough to penetrate.

Cosmo Versál alone remained in sight. Occasionally a quick motion showed
that even his nerves were not steady enough to defy the whistling of the
bullets passing close; but he held his ground, and stretched out his
hand to implore attention.

When the fusillade ceased for a moment he put his trumpet again to his
lips and shouted:

"I have done my best to save you, but you would not listen. Although I
know that you must perish, I would not myself harm a hair of your heads.
Go back, I implore you. You may prolong your lives if you will fly to
the highlands and the mountains--but here you cannot enter. _The ark
is full._"

Another volley of shots was the only answer. One broad-shouldered man
forced his way to the front, took his stand close to the wall, and
yelled in stentorian tones:

"Cosmo Versál, listen to me! You are the curse of the world! You have
brought this flood upon us with your damnable incantations. Your
infernal nebula is the seal of Satan! Here, beast and devil, here at my
feet, lies my only son, slain by your hellish device. By the Eternal I
swear you shall go back to the pit!"

Instantly a pistol flashed in the speaker's hand, and five shots rang in
quick succession. One after another they whistled by Cosmo's head and
flattened themselves upon the metal-work behind. Cosmo Versál,
untouched, folded his arms and looked straight at his foe. The man,
staring a moment confusedly, as if he could not comprehend his failure,
threw up his arms with a despairing gesture, and fell prone upon the
ground.

Then yells and shots once more broke out. Cosmo stepped back, and a
great metallic door swung to, closing the gangway.

But three minutes later the door opened, and the mob saw two
machine-guns trained upon them.

Once more Cosmo appeared, with the trumpet.

"If you fire again," he cried, "I shall sweep you with grapeshot. I have
told you how you can prolong your lives. Now go!"

Not another shot was fired. In the face of the guns, whose terrible
power all comprehended, no one dared to make a hostile movement.

But, perhaps, if Cosmo Versál had not set new thoughts running in the
minds of the assailants by telling them there was temporary safety to be
found by seeking high ground, even the terror of the guns would not have
daunted them. Now their hopefulness was reawakened, and many began to
ponder upon his words.

"He says we must perish, and yet that we can find safety in the hills
and mountains," said one man. "I believe half of that is a lie. We are
not going to be drowned. The water won't rise much higher. The flood
from the south pole that they talk about must be here by this time, and
then what's left to come?"

"The nebula," suggested one.

"Aw, the nebula be hanged! There's no such thing! I live on high ground;
I'm going to keep a sharp outlook, and if the water begins to shut off
Manhattan I'll take my family up the Hudson to the Highlands. I guess
old Storm King'll keep his head above. That's where I come from--up that
way. I used to hear people say when I was a boy that New York was bound
to sink some day. I used to laugh at that then, but it looks mighty like
it now, don't it?"

"Say," put in another, "what did the fellow mean by saying the ark was
_full_? That's funny, ain't it? Who's he got inside, anyway?"

"Oh, he ain't got nobody," said another.

"Yes, he has. I seen a goodish lot through the portholes. He's got
somebody, sure."

"A lot of fools like himself, most likely."

"Well, if he's a fool, and they's fools, what are _we_, I'd like to
know? What did you come here for, hey?"

It was a puzzling question, and brought forth only a sheepish laugh,
followed by the remark:

"I guess we fooled ourselves considerable. We got scared too easy."

"Maybe you'll feel scared again when you see the water climbing up the
streets in New York. I don't half like this thing. I'm going to follow
his advice and light out for higher ground."

Soon conversation of this sort was heard on all sides, and the crowd
began to disperse, only those lingering behind who had friends or
relatives that had been struck down at the fatal wall. It turned out
that not more than one or two had been mortally shocked. The rest were
able to limp away, and many had fully recovered within five minutes
after suffering the shock. In half an hour not a dozen persons were in
sight from the ark.

But when the retreating throngs drew near the shores of the Sound, and
the East River, which had expanded into a true arm of the sea, and found
that there had been a perceptible rise since they set out to capture the
ark, they began to shake their heads and fear once more entered their
hearts.

Thousands then and there resolved that they would not lose another
instant in setting out for high land, up the Hudson, in Connecticut,
among the hills of New Jersey. In fact, many had already fled thither,
some escaping on aeros; and hosts would now have followed but for a
marvelous change that came just before nightfall and prevented them.

For some days the heavens had alternately darkened and lightened, as
gushes of mist came and went, but there had been no actual rain. Now,
without warning, a steady downpour began. Even at the beginning it would
have been called, in ordinary times, a veritable cloudburst; but it
rapidly grew worse and worse, until there was no word in the vernacular
or in the terminology of science to describe it.

It seemed, in truth, that "all the fountains of the great deep were
broken up, and the windows of heaven were opened." The water thundered
upon the roofs, and poured off them in torrents. In five minutes every
sloping street had become an angry river, and every level place a
swelling lake. People caught out of doors were almost beaten to the
ground by the force of the water falling upon them as if they had been
standing under a cataract.

In a short time every cellar and every basement was filled to
overflowing, and in the avenues the flood, lapping every instant higher
upon the doorsteps and the walls, rushed by with frightful roarings,
bearing in its awful embrace pieces of furniture, clothing, bedding,
washed out of ground-floor rooms--and, alas! human beings; some
motionless, already mercifully deprived of life, but others struggling
and shouting for aid which could not be given.

So terrible a spectacle no one had ever looked upon, no one had ever
imagined. Those who beheld it were too stunned to cry out, too
overwhelmed with terror and horror to utter a word. They stood, or fell
into chairs or upon the floor, trembling in every limb, with staring
eyes and drooping jaws, passively awaiting their fate.

As night came on there was no light. The awful darkness of the _third
sign_ once more settled upon the great city, but now it was not the
terror of indefinite expectation that crushed down the souls of men and
women--it was the weight of doom accomplished!

There was no longer any room for self-deception; every quaking heart
felt now that the nebula had come. _Cosmo Versál had been right!_

After the water had attained a certain height in the streets and yards,
depending upon the ratio between the amount descending from the sky and
that which could find its way to the rivers, the flood for the time
being rose no higher. The actual drowning of New York could not happen
until the Hudson and the East River should become so swollen that the
water would stand above the level of the highest buildings, and turn the
whole region round about, as far as the Orange hills, the Ramapo
Mountains, the Highlands, and the Housatonic hills, into an inland sea.

But before we tell that story we must return to see what was going on at
Mineola. Cosmo Versál, on that awful night when New York first knew
beyond the shadow of a doubt, or the gleam of a hope, that it was
doomed, presided over a remarkable assembly in the grand saloon of his
ark.




CHAPTER IX

THE COMPANY OF THE REPRIEVED


How did it happen that Cosmo Versál was able to inform the mob when it
assailed the ark that he had no room left?

Who composed his ship's company, whence had they come, and how had they
managed to embark without the knowledge of the public?

The explanation is quite simple. It was all due to the tremendous
excitement that had prevailed ever since the seas began to overflow. In
the universal confusion people had to think of other things nearer their
doors than the operations of Cosmo Versál. Since the embarkation of the
animals the crowds had ceased to visit the field at Mineola, and it was
only occasionally that even a reporter was sent there. Accordingly,
there were many hours every day when no curiosity-seekers were in sight
of the ark, and at night the neighborhood was deserted; and this state
of affairs continued until the sudden panic which led to the attack that
has been described.

Cosmo Versál, of course, had every reason to conceal the fact that he
was carefully selecting his company. It was a dangerous game to play,
and he knew it. The consequence was that he enjoined secrecy upon his
invited guests, and conducted them, a few at a time, into the ark,
assuring them that their lives might be in peril if they were
recognized. And once under the domain of the fear which led them to
accept his invitation, they were no less anxious than he to avoid
publicity. Some of them probably desired to avoid recognition through
dread of ridicule; for, after all, the flood might not turn out to be so
bad as Cosmo had predicted.

So it happened that the ark was filled, little by little, and the public
knew nothing about it.

And who composed the throng which, while the awful downpour roared on
the ellipsoidal cover of the ark, and shook it to its center and while
New York, a few miles away, saw story after story buried under the
waters, crowded Cosmo's brilliantly lighted saloon, and raised their
voices to a high pitch in order to be heard?

Had all the invitations which he dictated to Joseph Smith after their
memorable discussion, and which were sent forth in the utmost haste,
flying to every point of the compass, been accepted, and was it the
famous leaders of science, the rulers and crowned heads who had passed
his critical inspection that were now knocking elbows under the great
dome of levium? Had kings and queens stolen incognito under the shelter
of the ark, and magnates of the financial world hidden themselves there?

It would have been well for them all if they had been there. But, in
fact, many of those to whom the invitations had gone did not even take
the trouble to thank their would-be savior. A few, however, who did not
come in person, sent responses. Among these was the President of the
United States. Mr. Samson's letter was brief but characteristic. It
read:

To COSMO VERSÁL, ESQ.

Sir:

The President directs me to say that he is grateful for your invitation,
and regrets that he cannot accept it. He is informed by those to whose
official advice he feels bound to listen, that the recent extraordinary
events possess no such significance as you attach to them.

Respectfully, FOR THE PRESIDENT,

JAMES JENKS, Secretary.

It must be remembered that this letter was written before the oceanic
overflow began. After that, possibly, the President and his advisers
changed their opinion. But then communication by rail was cut off, and
as soon as the downpour from the sky commenced the aero express lines
were abandoned. The airships would have been deluged, and blown to
destruction by the tremendous gusts which, at intervals, packed the
rain-choked air itself into solid billows of water.

None of the rulers of the old world responded, but about half the men of
science, and representatives of the other classes that Cosmo had set
down on his list, were wise enough to accept, and they hurried to New
York before the means of transit by land and sea were destroyed.

Among these were Englishmen, Frenchmen, Italians, Spaniards, Germans,
Austrians, Poles, people from the Balkan states, Swedes, Danes,
Russians, and a few from India, China, and Japan. The clatter of their
various tongues made a very Babel inside the ark, when they talked to
one another in groups, but nearly all of them were able to speak
English, which, after many years of experiment, had been adopted as the
common language for transacting the world's affairs.

There was another letter, which Cosmo read with real regret, although
hardly with surprise. It was from Professor Pludder. Instead of
expressing gratitude for the invitation, as the President, trained in
political blandiloquence, had done, Professor Pludder indulged in
denunciation.

"You are insane," he said. "You do not know what you are talking about.
Your letter is an insult to science. These inundations" (this, too, was
written before the sky had opened its flood-gates) "are perfectly
explicable by the ordinary laws of nature. Your talk of a nebula is so
ridiculous that it deserves no reply. If any lunatic accepts your absurd
invitation, and goes into your 'ark,' he will find himself in Bedlam,
where he ought to be."

"I guess you were right," Cosmo remarked to Joseph Smith, after reading
this outburst. "Pludder would not contribute to the regeneration of
mankind. We are better off without him."

But Cosmo Versál was mistaken in thinking he had heard the last of Abiel
Pludder. The latter was destined to show that he was hardly a less
remarkable specimen of _homo sapiens_ than the big-headed prophet
of the second deluge himself.

As soon as it became evident that there would be room to spare in the
ark, Cosmo set at work to fill up the list. He went over his categories
once more, but now, owing to the pressure of time, he was obliged to
confine his selections to persons within easy reach. They came, nearly
all, from New York, or its vicinity; and since these last invitations
went out just on the eve of the events described in the last two
chapters, there was no delay in the acceptances, and the invitees
promptly presented themselves in person.

Cosmo's warning to them of the necessity of secrecy was superfluous, for
the selfishness of human nature never had a better illustration than
they afforded. The lucky recipients of the invitations stole away
without a word of farewell, circumspectly disappearing, generally at
night, and often in disguise; and when the attack occurred on the ark,
there were, behind the portholes, many anxious eyes cautiously staring
out and recognizing familiar faces in the mob, while the owners of those
eyes trembled in their shoes lest their friends might succeed in forcing
an entrance. After all, it was to be doubted if Cosmo Versál, with all
his vigilance, had succeeded in collecting a company representing
anything above the average quality of the race.

But there was one thing that did great credit to his heart. When he
found that he had room unoccupied, before adding to his lists he
consented to take more than two children in a family. It was an immense
relief, for--it must be recorded--there were some who, in order to
qualify themselves, had actually abandoned members of their own
families! Let it also be said, however, that many, when they found that
the conditions imposed were inexorable, and that they could only save
themselves by leaving behind others as dear to them as their own lives,
indignantly refused, and most of these did not even reply to the
invitations.

It was another indication of Cosmo's real humanity, as well as of his
shrewdness, that, as far as they were known, and could be reached, the
persons who had thus remained true to the best instincts of nature were
the first to receive a second invitation, with an injunction to bring
their entire families. So it happened that, after all, there were aged
men and women, as well as children in arms, mingled in that remarkable
assemblage.

It will be recalled that thirteen places had been specially reserved, to
be filled by Cosmo Versál's personal friends. His choice of these
revealed another pleasing side of his mind. He took thirteen men and
women who had been, in one capacity or another, employed for many years
in his service. Some of them were old family servants that had been in
his father's house.

"Every one of these persons," he said to Joseph Smith, "is worth his
weight in gold. Their disinterested fidelity to duty is a type of
character that almost became extinct generations ago, and no more
valuable leaven could be introduced into the society of the future.
Rather than leave them, I would stay behind myself."

Finally there was the crew. This comprised one hundred and fifty
members, all of them chosen from the body of engineers, mechanics, and
workmen who had been employed in the construction of the ark. Cosmo
himself was, of course, the commander, but he had for his lieutenants
skilled mariners, electrical and mechanical engineers, and men whom he
himself had instructed in the peculiar duties that would fall to them in
the navigation and management of the ark, every detail of which he had
laboriously worked out with a foresight that seemed all but superhuman.

All of the passengers and crew were aboard when the baffled mob
retreated from Mineola, and some, when that danger was past, wished to
descend to the ground, and go and look at the rising waters, which had
not yet invaded the neighborhood. But Cosmo absolutely forbade any
departures from the ark. The condensation of the nebula, he declared,
was likely to begin any minute, and the downpour would be so fierce that
a person might be drowned in the open field.

It came even sooner than he had anticipated, with the results that we
have already noted in New York. At first many thought that the ark
itself would be destroyed, so dreadful was the impact of the falling
water. The women and children, and some of the men, were seized with
panic, and Cosmo had great difficulty in reassuring them.

"The flood will not reach us for several hours yet," he said. "The level
of the water must rise at least a hundred feet more before we shall be
afloat. Inside here we are perfectly safe. The ark is exceedingly strong
and absolutely tight. You have nothing to fear."

Then he ordered an ingenious sound-absorbing screen, which he had
prepared, to be drawn over the great ceiling of the saloon, the effect
of which was to shut out the awful noise of the water roaring upon the
roof of the ark. A silence that was at first startling by contrast to
the preceding din prevailed as soon as the screen was in place.

Amid a hush of expectancy, Cosmo now mounted a dais at one end of the
room. Never before had the intellectual superiority of the man seemed so
evident. His huge "dome of thought," surmounting his slight body,
dominated the assembly like the front of Jove. Chairs near him were
occupied by Professor Jeremiah Moses, Professor Abel Able, Professor
Alexander Jones, and the two "speculative geniuses" whom he had named to
Joseph Smith. These were Costaké Theriade, of Rumania, a tall, dark,
high-browed thinker, who was engaged in devising ways to extract and
recover interatomic energy; and Sir Wilfred Athelstone, whose specialty
was bio-chemistry, and who was said to have produced amazing results in
artificial parthenogenesis and the production of new species.

As soon as attention was concentrated upon him, Cosmo Versál began to
speak.

"My friends," he said, "the world around us is now sinking beneath a
flood that will not be arrested until America, Europe, Africa, Asia, and
Australia have disappeared. We stand at the opening of a new age. You
alone who are here assembled, and your descendants, will constitute the
population of the new world that is to be.

"In this ark, which owes its existence to the foreseeing eye of science,
you will be borne in safety upon the bosom of the battling waters, and
we will disembark upon the first promising land that reappears, and
begin the plantation and development of a new society of men and women,
which, I trust, will afford a practical demonstration of the principles
of eugenics.

"I have, as far as possible, and as far as the pitiful blindness of
mankind permitted me to go, selected and assembled here representatives
of the best tendencies of humanity. You are a chosen remnant, and the
future of this planet depends upon you.

"I have been fortunate in securing the companionship of men of science
who will be able to lead and direct. The ark is fully provisioned for a
period which must exceed the probable duration of the flood. I have
taken pains not to overcrowd it, and every preparation has been made for
any contingencies which may arise.

"It is inexpressibly sad to part thus with the millions of our
fellow-beings who would not heed the warnings that were lavished upon
them; but, while our hearts may be rent with the thought, it is our duty
to cast off the burden of vain regrets and concentrate all our energies
upon the great work before us.

"I salute," he continued, raising his voice and lifting a glass of wine
from the little table before him, "the world of the past--may its faults
be forgotten--and the world of the future--may it rise on the wings of
science to nobler prospects!"

He poured out the wine like a libation; and as his voice ceased to echo,
and he sank into his seat, an uncontrollable wave of emotion ran over
the assembly. Many of the women wept, and the men conversed in whispers.
After a considerable interval, during which no one spoke above his
breath, Professor Able Abel arose and said:

"The gratitude which we owe to this man"--indicating Cosmo Versál--"can
best be expressed, not in words, but by acts. He has led us thus far; he
must continue to lead us to the end. We were blind, while he was full of
light. It will become us hereafter to heed well whatever he may say. I
now wish to ask if he can foresee where upon the re-emerging planet a
foothold is first likely to be obtained. Where lies our land of
promise?"

"I can answer that question," Cosmo replied, "only in general terms. You
are all aware that the vast table-land of Tibet is the loftiest region
upon the globe. In its western part it lies from fourteen to seventeen
or eighteen thousand feet above the ordinary level of the sea. Above it
rise the greatest mountain peaks in existence. Here the first
considerable area is likely to be uncovered. It is upon the Pamirs, the
'Roof of the World,' that we shall probably make our landing."

"May I ask," said Professor Abel Able, "in what manner you expect the
waters of the flood to be withdrawn, after the earth is completely
drowned?"

"That," was the reply, "was one of the fundamental questions that I
examined, but I do not care to enter into a discussion of it now. I may
simply say that it is not only upon the disappearance of the waters that
our hopes depend, but upon circumstances that I shall endeavor to make
clear hereafter. The new cradle of mankind will be located near the old
one, and the roses of the Vale of Cashmere will canopy it."

Cosmo Versál's words made a profound impression upon his hearers, and
awoke thoughts that carried their minds off into strange reveries. No
more questions were asked, and gradually the assemblage broke up into
groups of interested talkers.

It was now near midnight. Cosmo, beckoning Professor Abel Able,
Professor Alexander Jones, and Professor Jeremiah Moses to accompany
him, made his way out of the saloon, and, secretly opening one of the
gangway doors, they presently stood, sheltering themselves from the
pouring rain, in a position which enabled them to look toward New York.

Nothing, of course, was visible through the downpour; but they were
startled at hearing fearful cries issuing out of the darkness. The rural
parts of the city, filled with gardens and villas, lay round within a
quarter of a mile of the ark, and the sound, accelerated by the
water-charged atmosphere, struck upon their ears with terrible
distinctness. Sometimes, when a gust of wind blew the rain into their
faces, the sound deepened into a long, despairing wail, which seemed to
be borne from afar off, mingled with the roar of the descending
torrent--the death-cry of the vast metropolis!

"Merciful Heaven, I cannot endure this!" cried Professor Moses.

"Go to my cabin," Cosmo yelled in his ear, "and take the others with
you. I will join you there in a little while. I wish to measure the rate
of rise of the water."

They gladly left him, and fled into the interior of the ark. Cosmo
procured an electric lamp; and the moment its light streamed out he
perceived that the water had already submerged the great cradle in which
the ark rested, and was beginning to creep up the metallic sides. He
lowered a graduated tape into it, provided with an automatic register.
In a few minutes he had completed his task, and then he went to rejoin
his late companions in his cabin.

"In about an hour," he said to them, "we shall be afloat. The water is
rising at the rate of one-thirtieth of an inch per second."

"No more than that?" asked Professor Jones with an accent of surprise.

"That is quite enough," Cosmo replied. "One-thirtieth of an inch per
second means two inches in a minute, and ten feet in an hour. In
twenty-four hours from now the water will stand two hundred and forty
feet above its present level, and then only the tallest structures in
New York will lift their tops above it, if, indeed, they are not long
before overturned by undermining or the force of the waves."

"But it will be a long time before the hills and highlands are
submerged," suggested Professor Jones. "Are you perfectly sure that the
flood will cover them?"

Cosmo Versál looked at his interlocutor, and slowly shook his head.

"It is truly a disappointment to me," he said at length, "to find that,
even now, remnants of doubt cling to your minds. I tell you that the
nebula is condensing at its maximum rate. It is likely to continue to do
so for at least four months. In four months, at the rate of two inches
per minute, the level of the water will rise 28,800 feet. There is only
one peak in the world which is surely known to attain a slightly greater
height than that--Mount Everest, in the Himalayas. Even in a single
month the rise will amount to 7,200 feet. That is 511 feet higher than
the loftiest mountain in the Appalachians. In one month, then, there
will be nothing visible of North America east of the Rockies. And in
another month they will have gone under."

Not another word was said. The three professors sat, wide-eyed and
open-mouthed, staring at Cosmo Versál, whose bald head was crowned with
an aureole by the electric light that beamed from the ceiling, while,
with a gold pocket pencil, he fell to figuring upon a sheet of paper.




CHAPTER X

THE LAST DAY OF NEW YORK


While Cosmo Versál was calculating, from the measured rise of the water,
the rate of condensation of the nebula, and finding that it added
twenty-nine trillion two hundred and ninety billion tons to the weight
of the earth every minute--a computation that seemed to give him great
mental satisfaction--the metropolis of the world, whose nucleus was the
island of Manhattan, and every other town and city on the globe that
lay near the ordinary level of the sea, was swiftly sinking beneath the
swelling flood.

Everywhere, over all the broad surface of the planet, a wail of despair
arose from the perishing millions, beaten down by the water that poured
from the unpitying sky. Even on the highlands the situation was little
better than in the valleys. The hills seemed to have been turned into the
crests of cataracts from which torrents of water rushed down on all sides,
stripping the soil from the rocks, and sending the stones and bowlders
roaring and leaping into the lowlands and the gorges. Farmhouses, barns,
villas, trees, animals, human beings--all were swept away together.

Only on broad elevated plateaus, where higher points rose above the general
level, were a few of the inhabitants able to find a kind of refuge. By
seeking these high places, and sheltering themselves as best they could
among immovable rocks, they succeeded, at least, in delaying their fate.
Notwithstanding the fact that the atmosphere was filled with falling water,
they could yet breathe, if they kept the rain from striking directly in
their faces. It was owing to this circumstance, and to some extraordinary
occurrences which we shall have to relate, that the fate of the human race
was not precisely that which Cosmo Versál had predicted.

We quitted the scene in New York when the shadow of night had just fallen,
and turned the gloom of the watery atmosphere into impenetrable darkness.
The events of that dreadful night we shall not attempt to depict. When the
hours of daylight returned, and the sun should have brightened over the
doomed city, only a faint, phosphorescent luminosity filled the sky. It
was just sufficient to render objects dimly visible. If the enclosing
nebula had remained in a cloud-like state it would have cut off all light,
but having condensed into raindrops, which streamed down in parallel lines,
except when sudden blasts of wind swept them into a confused mass, the
sunlight was able to penetrate through the interstices, aided by the
transparency of the water, and so a slight but variable illumination was
produced.

In this unearthly light many tall structures of the metropolis, which had
as yet escaped the effects of undermining by the rushing torrents in the
streets, towered dimly toward the sky, shedding streams of water from every
cornice. Most of the buildings of only six or eight stories had already
been submerged, with the exception of those that stood on the high grounds
in the upper part of the island, and about Spuyten Duyvil.

In the towers and upper stories of the lofty buildings still standing in
the heart of the city, crowds of unfortunates assembled, gazing with
horror at the spectacles around them, and wringing their hands in helpless
despair. When the light brightened they could see below them the angry
water, creeping every instant closer to their places of refuge, beaten
into foam by the terrible downpour, and sometimes, moved by a mysterious
impulse, rising in sweeping waves which threatened to carry everything
before them.

Every few minutes one of the great structures would sway, crack, crumble,
and go down into the seething flood, the cries of the lost souls being
swallowed up in the thunder of the fall. And when this occurred within
sight of neighboring towers yet intact, men and women could be seen, some
with children in their arms, madly throwing themselves from windows and
ledges, seeking quick death now that hope was no more!

Strange and terrible scenes were enacted in the neighborhood of what had
been the water-fronts. Most of the vessels moored there had been virtually
wrecked by the earlier invasion of the sea. Some had been driven upon the
shore, others had careened and been swamped at their wharves. But a few had
succeeded in cutting loose in time to get fairly afloat. Some tried to go
out to sea, but were wrecked by running against obstacles, or by being
swept over the Jersey flats. Some met their end by crashing into the
submerged pedestal of the Statue of Liberty. Others steered up the course
of the Hudson River, but that had become a narrow sea, filled with floating
and tossing debris of every sort, and all landmarks being invisible, the
luckless navigators lost their way, and perished, either through collisions
with other vessels, or by driving upon a rocky shore.

The fate of the gigantic building containing the offices of the municipal
government, which stood near the ancient City Hall, and which had been the
culminating achievement of the famous epoch of "sky-scrapers," was a thing
so singular, and at the same time dramatic, that in a narrative dealing
with less extraordinary events than we are obliged to record it would
appear altogether incredible.

With its twoscore lofty stories, and its massive base, this wonderful
structure rose above the lower quarter of the city, and dominated it, like
a veritable Tower of Babel, made to defy the flood. Many thousands of
people evidently regarded it in that very light, and they had fled from all
quarters, as soon as the great downpour began, to find refuge within its
mountainous flanks. There were men--clerks, merchants, brokers from the
downtown offices--and women and children from neighboring tenements.

By good chance, but a few weeks before, this building had been fitted with
a newly invented system of lighting, by which each story was supplied with
electricity from a small dynamo of its own, and so it happened that now the
lamps within were all aglow, lightening the people's hearts a little with
their cheering radiance.

Up and up they climbed, the water ever following at their heels, from floor
to floor, until ten of the great stages were submerged. But there were more
than twice as many stages yet above, and they counted them with unexpiring
hope, telling one another, with the assurance of desperation, that long
before the flood could attain so stupendous an altitude the rain would
surely cease, and the danger, as far as they were concerned, would pass
away.

"See! See!" cries one. "It is stopping! It is coming no higher! I've been
watching that step, and the water has stopped! It hasn't risen for ten
minutes!"

"Hurrah! Hurrah!" yells the crowd behind and above. And the glad cry is
taken up and reverberated from story to story until it bursts wildly out
into the rain-choked air at the very summit.

"Hurrah! Hurrah! We are saved! The flood has stopped!"

Men madly embrace each other. Women burst into tears and hug their children
to their breasts, filled with a joy and thankfulness that can find no
expression in words.

"You are wrong," says another man, crouching beside him who first spoke.
"It has not stopped--it is still rising."

"_What_! I tell you it _has_ stopped," snaps the other. "Look at that step!
It stopped right below it."

"_You've been watching the wrong step_. It's rising!"

"You fool! Shut your mouth! I say it has _stopped_."

"No, it has not."

"It has! It has!"

"Look at _that_ step, then! See the water just now coming over it."

The obstinate optimist stares a moment, turns pale, and then, with an oath,
strikes his more clear-headed neighbor in the face! And the excited crowd
behind, with the blind instinctive feeling that, somehow, he has robbed
them of the hope which was but now as the breath of life to them, strike
him and curse him, too.

But he had seen only too clearly.

With the steady march of fate--two inches a minute, as Cosmo Versál had
accurately measured it--the water still advances and climbs upward.

In a little while they were driven to another story, and then to another.
But hope would not down. They could not believe that the glad news, which
had so recently filled them with joy, was altogether false. The water
_must_ have stopped rising _once_; it had been _seen_. Then, it would
surely stop _again_, stop to rise no more.

Poor deluded creatures! With the love of life so strong within them, they
could not picture, in their affrighted minds, the terrible consummation to
which they were being slowly driven, when, jammed into the narrow chambers
at the very top of the mighty structure, their remorseless enemy would
seize them at last.

But they were nearer the end than they could have imagined even if they had
accepted and coolly reasoned upon the facts that were so plain before them.
And, after all, it was not to come upon them only after they had fought
their way to the highest loft and into the last corner.

A link of this strange chain of fatal events now carries us to the spot
where the United States Navy Yard in Brooklyn once existed. That place was
sunk deep beneath the waters. All of the cruisers, battleships, and other
vessels that had been at anchor or at moorings there had gone under. One
only, the boast of the American navy, the unconquerable _Uncle Sam_, which,
in the last great war that the world had known, had borne the starry flag
to victories whose names broke men's voices and filled their eyes with
tears of pride, had escaped, through the incomparable seamanship of Captain
Robert Decatur, who had been her commander for thirty years.

But though the _Uncle Sam_ managed to float upon the rising flood, she
was unable to get away because of the obstructions lodged about the great
bridges that spanned the East River. A curious eddy that the raging
currents formed over what was once the widest part of that stream kept
her revolving round and round, never departing far in any direction,
and, with majestic strength, riding down or brushing aside the floating
timbers, wooden houses, and other wreckage that pounded furiously against
her mighty steel sides.

Just at the time when the waters had mounted to the eighteenth story of the
beleaguered Municipal Building, a sudden change occurred in these currents.
They swept westward with resistless force, and the _Uncle Sam_ was
carried directly over the drowned city. First she encountered the cables of
the Manhattan Bridge, striking them near the western tower, and, swinging
round, wrenched the tower itself from its foundations and hurled it beneath
the waters.

Then she rushed on, riding with the turbid flood high above the buried
roofs, finding no other obstruction in her way until she approached the
Municipal Building, which was stoutly resisting the push of the waves.


[Illustration: "THE GREAT BATTLESHIP... CRASHED, PROW ON, INTO THE STEEL-
RIBBED WALLS"]


Those who were near the windows and on the balconies, on the eastern side
of the building, saw the great battleship coming out of the gray gloom
like some diluvian monster, and before they could comprehend what it was,
it crashed, prow on, into the steel-ribbed walls, driving them in as if
they had been the armored sides of an enemy.

So tremendous was the momentum of the striking mass that the huge vessel
passed, like a projectile, through walls and floors and partitions. But as
she emerged in the central court the whole vast structure came thundering
down upon her, and ship and building together sank beneath the boiling
waves.

But out of the awful tangle of steel girders, that whipped the air and the
water as if some terrible spidery life yet clung to them, by one of those
miracles of chance which defy all the laws of probability and reason, a
small boat of levium, that had belonged to the _Uncle Sam_, was cast forth,
and floated away, half submerged but unsinkable; and clinging to its
thwarts, struggling for breath, insane with terror, were two men, the sole
survivors of all those thousands.

One of them was a seaman who had taken refuge, with a crowd of comrades,
in the boat before the battleship rushed down upon the building. All of
his comrades had been hurled out and lost when the blow came, while his
present companion was swept in and lodged against the thwarts. And so
those two waifs drove off in the raging waves. Both of them were bleeding
from many wounds, but they had no fatal hurts.

The boat, though filled with water, was so light that it could not sink.
Moreover, it was ballasted, and amid all its wild gyrations it kept right
side up. Even the ceaseless downpour from the sky could not drive it
beneath the waves.

After a while the currents that had been setting westward changed their
direction, and the boat was driven toward the north. It swept on past
toppling skyscrapers until it was over the place where Madison Square once
spread its lawns, looked down upon by gigantic structures, most of which
had now either crumbled and disappeared or were swaying to their fall. Here
there was an eddy, and the boat turned round and round amid floating debris
until two other draggled creatures, who had been clinging to floating
objects, succeeded by desperate efforts in pulling themselves into it.
Others tried but failed, and no one lent a helping hand. Those who were
already in the boat neither opposed nor aided the efforts of those who
battled to enter it. No words were heard in the fearful uproar--only
inarticulate cries.

Suddenly the current changed again, and the boat, with its dazed occupants,
was hurried off in the direction of the Hudson. Night was now beginning
once more to drop an obscuring curtain over the scene, and under that
curtain the last throes of drowning New York were hidden. When the sun
again faintly illuminated the western hemisphere the whole Atlantic
seaboard was buried under the sea.

As the water rose higher, Cosmo Versál's Ark at last left its cradle, and
cumbrously floated off, moving first eastward, then turning in the
direction of Brooklyn and Manhattan. Cosmo had his engines in operation,
but their full power was not developed as soon as he had expected, and
the great vessel drifted at the will of the currents and the wind, the
latter coming now from one side and now from another, rising at times to
hurricane strength and then dying away until only a spanking breeze swept
the ever-falling rain into swishing sheets. Occasionally the wind failed
entirely, and for many minutes at a time the water fell in vertical
streams.

At length the motive power of the Ark was developed, and it began to obey
its helm. From the shelter of a "captain's bridge," constructed at the
forward end of the huge levium dome that covered the vessel, Cosmo Versál,
with Captain Arms, a liberally bewhiskered, veteran navigator in whose
skill he confided, peered over the interminable waste of waters. There was
nothing in sight except floating objects that had welled up from the
drowned city and the surrounding villages. Here and there the body of an
animal or a human being was seen in the tossing waves, and Cosmo Versál
sadly shook his head as he pointed them out, but the stout mariner at his
side chewed his tobacco, and paid attention only to his duties, shouting
orders from time to time through a speaking-tube, or touching an electric
button.

Cosmo Versál brought a rain-gage and again and again allowed it to fill
itself. The story was always the same--two inches per minute, ten feet per
hour, the water mounted.

The nebula had settled down to regular work, and, if Cosmo's calculations
were sound, there would be no intermission for four months.

After the power of the propellers had been developed the Ark was steered
southeastward. Its progress was very slow. In the course of eight hours
it had not gone more than fifty miles. The night came on, and the speed
was reduced until there was only sufficient way to insure the command of
the vessel's movements. Powerful searchlights were employed as long as
the stygian darkness continued.

With the return of the pallid light, at what should have been daybreak,
Cosmo and his navigator were again at their post. In fact, the former
had not slept at all, keeping watch through the long hours, with
Captain Arms within easy call.

As the light became stronger, Cosmo said to the captain:

"Steer toward New York. I wish to see if the last of the tall buildings on
the upper heights have gone under."

"It will be very dangerous to go that way," objected Captain Arms. "There
are no landmarks, and we may strike a snag."

"Not if we are careful," replied Cosmo. "All but the highest ground is now
buried very deep."

"It is taking a fool's risk," growled Captain Arms, through his brush, but
nevertheless he obeyed.

It was true that they had nothing to go by. The air was too thick with
water, and the light too feeble for them to be able to lay their course
by sighting the distant hills of New Jersey which yet remained above the
level of the flood. Still, by a kind of seaman's instinct, Captain Arms
made his way, until he felt that he ought to venture no farther. He had
just turned to Cosmo Versál with the intention of voicing his protest
when the Ark careened slightly, shivered from stem to stern, and then
began a bumping movement that nearly threw the two men from their feet.

"We are aground!" cried the captain, and instantly turned a knob that set
in motion automatic machinery which cut off the engines from the
propellers, and at the same time slowed down the engines themselves.




CHAPTER XI

"A BILLION FOR A SHARE"


The Ark had lodged on the loftiest part of the Palisades. It was only after
long and careful study of their position, rendered possible by occasional
glimpses of the Orange Hills and high points further up the course of the
Hudson, that Cosmo Versál and Captain Arms were able to reach that
conclusion. Where New York had stood nothing was visible but an expanse of
turbid and rushing water.

But suppose the hard trap rocks had penetrated the bottom of the Ark! It
was a contingency too terrible to be thought of. Yet the facts must be
ascertained at once.

Cosmo, calling Joseph Smith, and commanding him to go among the frightened
passengers and assure them, in his name, that there was no danger, hurried,
with the captain and a few trusty men, into the bowels of the vessel. They
thoroughly sounded the bottom plates. No aperture and no indentation was
to be found.

But, then, the bottom was double, and the outer plates might have been
perforated. If this had happened the fact would reveal itself through the
leakage of water into the intervening space. To ascertain if that had
occurred it was necessary to unscrew the covers of some of the manholes in
the inner skin of levium.

It was an anxious moment when they cautiously removed one of these covers.
At the last turns of the screw the workman who handled it instinctively
turned his head aside, and made ready for a spring, more than half
expecting that the cover would be driven from his hands, and a stream of
water would burst in.

But the cover remained in place after it was completely loosened, and until
it had been lifted off. A sigh of relief broke from every breast. No water
was visible.

"Climb in there, and explore the bottom," Cosmo commanded.

There was a space of eighteen inches between the two bottoms, which were
connected and braced by the curved ribs of the hull. A man immediately
disappeared in the opening and began the exploration. Cosmo ordered the
removal of other covers at various points, and the exploration was extended
over the whole bottom. He himself passed through one of the manholes and
aided in the work.

At last it was determined, beyond any doubt, that even the outer skin was
uninjured. Not so much as a dent could be found in it.

"By the favor of Providence," said Cosmo Versál, as his great head emerged
from a manhole, "the Ark has touched upon a place where the rocks are
covered with soil, and no harm has come to us. In a very short time the
rising water will lift us off."

"And, with my consent, you'll do no more navigating over hills and
mountains," grumbled Captain Arms. "The open sea for the sailor."

The covers were carefully replaced, and the party, in happier spirits,
returned to the upper decks, where the good news was quickly spread.

The fact was that while the inspection was under way the Ark had floated
off, and when Cosmo and the captain reached their bridge the man who had
been left in charge reported that the vessel had swung halfway round.

"She's headed for the old Atlantic," sung out Captain Arms. "The sooner
we're off the better."

But before the captain could signal the order to go ahead, Cosmo Versál
laid his hand on his arm and said:

"Wait a moment; listen."

Through the lashing of the rain a voice penetrated with a sound between a
call and a scream. There could be no doubt that it was human. The captain
and Cosmo looked at one another in speechless astonishment. The idea that
any one outside the Ark could have survived, and could now be afloat amid
this turmoil of waters, had not occurred to their minds. They experienced
a creeping of the nerves. In a few minutes the voice came again, louder
than before, and the words that it pronounced being now clearly audible,
the two listeners could not believe their ears.

"Cosmo Versál!" it yelled. "Cosmo-o-o Ver-sá-al! A billion for a share! A
_billion_, I say, a _bil-li-on_ for a share!"

Then they perceived a little way off to the left something which looked
like the outline of a boat, sunk to the gunwales, washed over by every
wave; and standing in it, up to their waists in water, were four men, one
of whom was gesticulating violently, while the others seemed dazed and
incapable of voluntary movement.

It was the boat of levium that had been thrown out of the wreckage when the
battleship ran down the Municipal tower, and we must now follow the thread
of its adventures up to the time of its encounter with the Ark.

As the boat was driven westward from the drowned site of Madison Square it
gradually freed itself from the objects floating around, most of which soon
sunk, and in an hour or two its inmates were alone--the sole survivors of a
dense population of many millions.

Alone they were in impenetrable darkness, for, as we have said, night had
by this time once more fallen.

They floated on, half drowned, chilled to the bone, not trying to speak,
not really conscious of one another's presence. The rain beat down upon
them, the waves washed over them, the unsinkable boat sluggishly rose and
fell with the heaving of the water, and occasionally they were nearly flung
overboard by a sudden lurch--and yet they clung with desperate tenacity to
the thwarts, as if life were still dear, as if they thought that they might
yet survive, though the world was drowned.

Thus hours passed, and at last a glimmer appeared in the streaming air, and
a faint light stole over the face of the water. If they saw one another,
it was with unrecognizing eyes. They were devoured with hunger, but they
did not know it.

Suddenly one of them--it was he who had been so miraculously thrown into
the boat when it shot out of the tangle of falling beams and walls--
raised his head and threw up his arms, a wild light gleaming in his eyes.

In a hoarse, screaming voice he yelled:

"Cosmo Versál!"

No other syllables that the tongue could shape would have produced the
effect of that name. It roused the three men who heard it from their
lethargy of despair, and thrilled them to the marrow. With amazed eyes they
stared at their companion. He did not look at them, but gazed off into the
thick rain. Again his voice rose in a maniacal shriek:

"Cosmo Versál! Do you hear me? Let me in! A billion for a share!"

The men looked at each other, and, even in their desperate situation, felt
a stir of pity in their hearts. They were not too dazed to comprehend that
their companion had gone mad. One of them moved to his side, and laid a
hand upon his shoulder, as if he would try to soothe him.

But the maniac threw him off, nearly precipitating him over the side of
the submerged boat, crying:

"What are _you_ doing in my boat? Overboard with you! I am looking for
Cosmo Versál! He's got the biggest thing afloat! Securities! Securities!
Gilt-edged! A _billion_, I tell you! Here I have them--look! Gilt-edged,
every one!" and he snatched a thick bundle of papers from his pocket and
waved them wildly until they melted into a pulpy mass with the downpour.

The others now shrank away from him in fear. Fear? Yes, for still they
loved their lives, and the staggering support beneath their feet had become
as precious to them as the solid earth. They would have fought with the
fury of madmen to retain their places in that half-swamped shell. They were
still capable of experiencing a keener fear than that of the flood. They
were as terrified by the presence of this maniac as they would have been
on encountering him in their homes.

But he did not attempt to follow them. He still looked off through the
driving rain, balancing himself to the sluggish lurching of the boat, and
continuing to rave, and shout, and shake his soaked bundle of papers,
until, exhausted by his efforts, and half-choked by the water that drove in
his face, he sank helpless upon a thwart.

Then they fell back into their lethargy, but in a little while he was on
his feet again, gesticulating and raging--and thus hours passed on, and
still they were afloat, and still clinging to life.

Suddenly, looming out of the strange gloom, they perceived the huge form of
the Ark, and all struggled to their feet, but none could find voice but the
maniac.

As soon as he saw the men, Cosmo Versál had run down to the lowest deck,
and ordered the opening of a gangway on that side. When the door swung
back he found himself within a few yards of the swamped boat, but ten feet
above its level. Joseph Smith, Professor Moses, Professor Jones, Professor
Able, and others of the passengers, and several of the crew, hurried to his
side, while the rest of the passengers crowded as near as they could get.

The instant that Cosmo appeared the maniac redoubled his cries.

"Here they are," he yelled, shaking what remained of his papers. "A
billion--all gilt-edged! Let me in. But shut out the others. They're
only little fellows. They've got no means. They can't float an enterprise
like this. Ah, you're a bright one! You and me, Cosmo Versál--we'll
squeeze 'em all out. I'll give you the secrets. We'll own the earth! I'm
_Amos Blank!_"

Cosmo Versál recognized the man in spite of the dreadful change that had
come over him. His face was white and drawn, his eyes staring, his head
bare, his hair matted with water, his clothing in shreds--but it was
unmistakably Amos Blank, a man whose features the newspapers had rendered
familiar to millions, a man who had for years stood before the public as
the unabashed representative of the system of remorseless repression of
competition, and shameless corruption of justice and legislation. After the
world, for nearly two generations, had enjoyed the blessings of the reforms
in business methods and social ideals that had been inaugurated by the
great uprising of the people in the first quarter of the twentieth
century, Amos Blank, and lesser men of his ilk, had swung back the
pendulum, and re-established more firmly than ever the reign of monopoly
and iniquitous privilege.

The water-logged little craft floated nearer until it almost touched the
side of the Ark directly below the gangway. The madman's eyes glowed with
eagerness, and he reached up his papers, continually yelling his refrain:
"A billion! Gilt-edged! Let me in! Don't give the rabble a show!"

Cosmo made no reply, but gazed down upon the man and his bedraggled
companions with impassive features, but thoughtful eyes. Any one who knew
him intimately, as Joseph Smith alone did, could have read his mind. He was
asking himself what he ought to do. Here was the whole fundamental question
to be gone over again. To what purpose had he taken so great pains to
select the flower of mankind? Here was the head and chief of the offense
that he had striven to eliminate appealing to him to be saved under
circumstances which went straight to the heart and awoke every sentiment of
humanity.

Presently he said in as low a voice as could be made audible:

"Joseph, advise me. What should I do?"

"You were willing to take Professor Pludder," replied Smith evasively, but
with a plain leaning to the side of mercy.

"You know very well that that was different," Cosmo returned irritably.
"Pludder was not morally rotten. He was only mistaken. He had the
fundamental scientific quality, and I'm sorry he threw himself away in
his obstinacy. But this man--"

"Since he is _alone_," broke in Joseph Smith with a sudden illumination,
"he could do no harm."

Cosmo Versál's expression instantly brightened.

"You are right!" he exclaimed. "By himself he can do nothing. I am sure
there is no one aboard who would sympathize with his ideas. Alone, he is
innocuous. Besides, he's insane, and I can't leave him to drown in that
condition. And I must take the others, too. Let down a landing stage," he
continued in a louder voice, addressing some members of the crew.

In a few minutes all four of the unfortunates, seeming more dead than live,
were helped into the Ark.

Amos Blank immediately precipitated himself upon Cosmo Versál, and, seizing
him by the arm, tried to lead him apart, saying in his ear, as he glared
round upon the faces of the throng which crowded every available space.

"Hist! Overboard with 'em! What's all this trash? Shovel 'em out!
They'll want to get in with us; they'll queer the game!"

Then he turned furiously upon the persons nearest him, and began to push
them toward the open gangway. At a signal from Cosmo Versál, two men
seized him and pinioned his arms. At that his mood changed, and,
wrenching himself loose, he once more ran to Cosmo, waving his bedraggled
bundle, and shouting:

"A billion! Here's the certificates--gilt-edge! But," he continued, with
a cunning leer, and suddenly thrusting the sodden papers into his pocket,
"you'll make out the receipts first. I'll put in _five_ billions to make
it a sure go, if you won't let in another soul."

Cosmo shook off the man's grasp, and again calling the two members of the
crew who had before pinioned his arms, told them to lead him away, at the
same time saying to him:

"You go with these men into my room. I'll see you later."

Blank took it in the best part, and willingly accompanied his conductors,
only stopping a moment to wink over his shoulder at Cosmo, and then he
was led through the crowd, which regarded him with unconcealed
astonishment, and in many cases with no small degree of fear. As soon as
he was beyond earshot, Cosmo directed Joseph Smith to hurry ahead of the
party and conduct them to a particular apartment, which he designated at
the same time, saying to Smith:

"Turn the key on him as soon as he's inside."

Amos Blank, now an insane prisoner in Cosmo Versál's Ark, had been the
greatest financial power in the world's metropolis, a man of iron nerve and
the clearest of brains, who always kept his head and never uttered a
foolish word. It was he who had stood over the flight of steps in the
Municipal Building, coolly measuring with his eye the rise of the water,
exposing the terrible error that sent such a wave of unreasoning joy
through the hearts of the thousands of refugees crowded into the doomed
edifice, and receiving blows and curses for making the truth known.

He had himself taken refuge there, after visiting his office and filling
his pockets with his most precious papers. How, by a marvelous stroke of
fate, he became one of the four persons who alone escaped from New York
after the downpour began is already known.


The other men taken from the boat were treated like rescued mariners
snatched from a wreck at sea. Every attention was lavished upon them, and
Cosmo Versál did not appear to regret, as far as they were concerned, that
his ship's company had been so unexpectedly recruited.




CHAPTER XII

THE SUBMERGENCE OF THE OLD WORLD


We now turn our attention for a time from the New World to the Old. What
did the thronging populations of Europe, Africa, and Asia do when the signs
of coming disaster chased one on another's heels, when the oceans began to
burst their bonds, and when the windows of the firmament were opened?

The picture that can be drawn must necessarily be very fragmentary,
because the number who escaped was small and the records that they left
are few.

The savants of the older nations were, in general, quite as incredulous
and as set in their opposition to Cosmo Versál's extraordinary out-
givings as those of America. They decried his science and denounced his
predictions as the work of a fool or a madman. The president of the Royal
Astronomical Society of Great Britain proved to the satisfaction of most
of his colleagues that a nebula could not possibly contain enough water
to drown an asteroid, let alone the earth.

"The nebulae," said this learned astronomer, amid the plaudits of his
hearers, "are infinitely rarer in composition than the rarest gas left
in the receiver of an exhausted air-pump. I would undertake to swallow
from a wineglass the entire substance of any nebula that could enter the
space between the earth and the sun, if it were condensed into the liquid
state."

"It might be intoxicating," called out a facetious member.

"Will the chair permit me to point out," said another with great gravity,
"that such a proceeding would be eminently rash, for the nebulous fluid
might be highly poisonous." ["Hear! Hear!" and laughter.]

"What do you say of this strange darkness and these storms?" asked an
earnest-looking man. (This meeting was held after the terrors of the
_third sign_ had occurred.)

"I say," replied the president, "that that is the affair of the
Meteorological Society, and has nothing to do with astronomy. I dare say
that they can account for it."

"And I dare say they can't," cried a voice.

"Hear! Hear!" "Who are you?" "Put him out!" "I dare say he's right!" "Cosmo
Versál!" Everybody was talking at once.

"Will this gentleman identify himself?" asked the president. "Will he
please explain his words?"

"That I will," said a tall man with long whiskers, rising at the rear end
of the room. "I am pretty well known. I----"

"It's Jameson, the astrologer," cried a voice. "What's _he_ doing here?"

"Yes," said the whiskered man, "it's Jameson, the astrologer, and he has
come here to let you know that Cosmo Versál was born under the sign Cancer,
the first of the watery triplicity, and that Berosus, the Chaldean,
declared----"

An uproar immediately ensued; half the members were on their feet at once;
there was a scuffle in the back part of the room, and Jameson, the
astrologer, was hustled out, shouting at the top of his voice:

"Berosus, the Chaldean, predicted that the world would be drowned when
all the planets should assemble in the sign Cancer--_and where are they
now?_ Blind and stupid dolts that you are--_where are they now?"_

It was some time before order could be restored, and a number of members
disappeared, having followed Jameson, the astrologer, possibly through
sympathy, or possibly with a desire to learn more about the prediction of
Berosus, the father of astrology.

When those who remained, and who constituted the great majority of the
membership, had quieted down, the president remarked that the interruption
which they had just experienced was quite in line with all the other
proceedings of the disturbers of public tranquillity who, under the lead
of a crazy American charlatan, were trying to deceive the ignorant
multitude. But they would find themselves seriously in error if they
imagined that their absurd ideas were going to be "taken over" in England.

"I dare say," he concluded, "that there is some _scheme_ behind it all."

"Another American 'trust'!" cried a voice.

The proceedings were finally brought to an end, but not before a modest
member had risen in his place and timidly remarked that there was one
question that he would like to put to the chair--one thing that did not
seem to have been made quite clear--"Where _were_ the planets now?"

A volley of hoots, mingled with a few "hears!" constituted the only
reply.

Scenes not altogether unlike this occurred in the other great learned
societies--astronomical, meteorological, and geological. The official
representatives of science were virtually unanimous in condemnation of
Cosmo Versál, and in persistent assertion that nothing that had occurred
was inexplicable by known laws. But in no instance did they make it clear
to anybody precisely what were the laws that they invoked, or how it
happened that Cosmo Versál had been able to predict so many strange things
which everybody knew really had come to pass, such as the sudden storms and
the great darkness.

We are still, it must not be forgotten, dealing with a time anterior to the
rising of the sea.

The Paris Academy of Sciences voted that the subject was unworthy of
serious investigation, and similar action was taken at Berlin, St.
Petersburg, Vienna, and elsewhere.

But among the people at large universal alarm prevailed, and nothing was
so eagerly read as the dispatches from New York, detailing the proceedings
of Cosmo Versál, and describing the progress of his great levium ark. In
England many procured copies of Cosmo's circulars, in which the proper
methods to be pursued in the construction of arks were carefully set forth.
Some set to work to build such vessels; but, following British methods of
construction, they doubled the weight of everything, with the result that,
if Cosmo had seen what they were about he would have told them that such
arks would go to the bottom faster than to the top.

In Germany the balloon idea took full possession of the public mind.
Germany had long before developed the greatest fleet of dirigible balloons
in existence, preferring them to every other type of flying apparatus. It
was reported that the Kaiser was of the opinion that if worst came to worst
the best manner of meeting the emergency would be by the multiplication of
dirigibles and the increase of their capacity.

The result was that a considerable number of wealthy Germans began the
construction of such vessels. But when interviewed they denied that they
were preparing for a flood. They said that they simply wished to enlarge
and increase the number of their pleasure craft, after the example of the
Kaiser. All this was in contemptuous defiance of the warning which Cosmo
Versál had been careful to insert in his circulars, that "balloons and
aeros of all kinds will be of no use whatever; the only safety will be
found in arks, and they must be provisioned for at least five years."

The most remarkable thing of all happened in France. It might naturally
have been expected that a Frenchman who thought it worth his while to take
any precautions against the extinction of the human race would, when it
became a question of a flood, have turned to the aero, for from the
commencement of aerial navigation French engineers had maintained an
unquestionable superiority in the construction and perfection of that kind
of machine.

Their aeros could usually fly longer and carry more dead weight than those
of any other nation. In the transoceanic aero races which occasionally took
place the French furnished the most daring and the most frequently
successful competitors.

But the French mind is masterly in appreciation of details, and Cosmo
Versál's reasons for condemning the aero and the balloon as means of
escaping the flood were promptly divined. In the first place it was seen
that no kind of airship could be successfully provisioned for a flight of
indefinite length, and in the second place the probable strength of the
winds, or the crushing weight of the descending water, in case, as Cosmo
predicted, a nebula should condense upon the earth, would either sweep an
aero or a balloon to swift destruction, or carry it down into the waves
like a water-soaked butterfly.

Accordingly, when a few Frenchmen began seriously to consider the
question of providing a way of escape from the flood--always supposing, for
the sake of argument, that there would be a flood--they got together, under
the leadership of an engineer officer named Yves de Beauxchamps, and
discussed the matter in all its aspects. They were not long in arriving at
the conclusion that the best and most logical thing that could possibly be
done would be to construct a _submarine_.

In fact, this was almost an inevitable conclusion for them, because before
the abandonment of submarines in war on account of their _too_ great
powers of destruction--a circumstance which had also led to the prohibition
of the use of explosive bombs in the aerial navies--the French had held
the lead in the construction and management of submersible vessels, even
more decisively than in the case of aeros.

"A large submarine," said De Beauxchamps, "into whose construction a
certain amount of levium entered, would possess manifest advantages over
Versál's Ark. It could be provisioned to any extent desired, it would
escape the discomforts of the waves, winds, and flooding rain, and it
could easily rise to the surface whenever that might be desirable for
change of air. It would have all the amphibious advantages of a whale."

The others were decidedly of De Beauxchamps's opinion, and it was
enthusiastically resolved that a vessel of this kind should be begun at
once.

"If we don't need it for a flood," said De Beauxchamps, "we can employ it
for a pleasure vessel to visit the wonders of the deep. We will then make
a reality of that marvelous dream of our countryman of old, that prince of
dreamers, Jules Verne."

"Let's name it for him!" cried one.

"Admirable! Charming!" they all exclaimed. "_Vive le 'Jules Verne'!_"

Within two days, but without the knowledge of the public, the keel of the
submersible _Jules Verne_ was laid. But we shall hear of that remarkable
craft again.

While animated, and in some cases violent, discussions were taking place
in the learned circles of Europe, and a few were making ready in such
manner as they deemed most effective for possible contingencies, waves of
panic swept over the remainder of the Old World. There were yet hundreds
of millions in Africa and Asia to whom the advantages of scientific
instruction had not extended, but who, while still more or less under the
dominion of ignorance and superstition, were in touch with the _news_ of
the whole planet.

The rumor that a wise man in America had discovered that the world was
to be drowned was not long in reaching the most remote recesses of the
African forests and of the boundless steppes of the greater continent,
and, however it might be ridiculed or received with skeptical smiles in
the strongholds of civilization, it met with ready belief in less
enlightened minds.

Then, the three "signs"--the first great heat, the onslaught of storm and
lightning, and the _Noche Triste_, the great darkness--had been world-wide
in their effects, and each had heightened the terror caused by its
predecessor. Moreover, in the less enlightened parts of the world the
reassurances of the astronomers and others did not penetrate at all, or,
if they did, had no effect, for not only does bad news run while good news
walks, but it talks faster.

It will be recalled that one of the most disquieting incidents in America,
immediately preceding the catastrophal rising of the oceans, was the
melting of the Arctic snows and ice-fields, with consequent inundations
in the north. This stage in the progress of the coming disaster was
accentuated in Europe by the existence of the vast glaciers of the Alps.
The Rocky Mountains, in their middle course, had relatively little snow and
almost no true glaciers, and consequently there were no scenes of this kind
in the United States comparable with those that occurred in the heart of
Europe.

After the alarm caused by the great darkness in September had died out, and
the long spell of continuous clear skies began, the summer resorts of
Switzerland were crowded as they had seldom been. People were driven there
by the heat, for one thing; and then, owing to the early melting of the
winter's deposit of snow, the Alps presented themselves in a new aspect.

Mountain-climbers found it easy to make ascents upon peaks which had always
hitherto presented great difficulties on account of the vast snow-fields,
seamed with dangerous crevasses, which hung upon their flanks. These were
now so far removed that it was practicable for amateur climbers to go where
always before only trained Alpinists, accompanied by the most experienced
guides, dared to venture.

But as the autumn days ran on and new snows fell, the deep-seated glaciers
began to dissolve, and masses of ice that had lain for untold centuries in
the mighty laps of the mountains, projecting frozen noses into the valleys,
came tumbling down, partly in the form of torrents of water and partly in
roaring avalanches.

The great Aletsch glacier was turned into a river that swept down into the
valley of the Rhône, carrying everything before it. The glaciers at the
head of the Rhône added their contribution. The whole of the Bernese
Oberland seemed to have suddenly been dissolved like a huge mass of sugar
candy, and on the north the valley of Interlaken was inundated, while the
lakes of Thun and Brientz were lost in an inland sea which rapidly spread
over all the lower lands between the Alps and the Swiss Jura.

Farther east the Rhine, swollen by the continual descent of the glacier
water, burst its banks, and broadened out until Strasburg lay under water
with the finger of its ancient cathedral helplessly pointing skyward out
of the midst of the flood. All the ancient cities of the great valley from
Basle to Mayence saw their streets inundated and the foundations of their
most precious architectural monuments undermined by the searching water.

The swollen river reared back at the narrow pass through the Taunus range,
and formed a huge eddy that swirled over the old city of Bingen. Then it
tore down between the castle-crowned heights, sweeping away the villages
on the river banks from Bingen to Coblentz, lashing the projecting rocks
of the Lorelei, and carrying off houses, churches, and old abbeys in a
rush of ruin.

It widened out as it approached Bonn and Cologne, but the water was still
deep enough to inundate those cities, and finally it spread over the plain
of Holland, finding a score of new mouths through which to pour into the
German Ocean, while the reclaimed area of the Zuyder Zee once more joined
the ocean, and Amsterdam and the other cities of the Netherlands were
buried, in many cases to the tops of the house doors.

West and south the situation was the same. The Mer de Glace at Chamonix,
and all the other glaciers of the Mont Blanc range, disappeared, sending
floods down to Geneva and over the Dauphiny and down into the plains of
Piedmont and Lombardy. The ruin was tremendous and the loss of life
incalculable. Geneva, Turin, Milan, and a hundred other cities, were
swept by torrents.

The rapidity of this melting of the vast snow-beds and glaciers of the
Alps was inconceivable, and the effect of the sudden denudation upon the
mountains themselves was ghastly. Their seamed and cavernous sides stood
forth, gaunt and naked, a revelation of Nature in her most fearful aspects
such as men had never looked upon. Mont Blanc, without its blanket of snow
and ice, towered like the blackened ruin of a fallen world, a sight that
made the beholders shudder.

But this flood ended as suddenly as it had begun. When the age-long
accumulations of snow had all melted the torrents ceased to pour down from
the mountains, and immediately the courageous and industrious inhabitants
of the Netherlands began to repair their broken dikes, while in Northern
Italy and the plains of Southeastern France every effort was made to
repair the terrible losses.

Of course similar scenes had been enacted, and on even a more fearful
scale, in the plains of India, flooded by the melting of the enormous icy
burden that covered the Himalayas, the "Abode of Snow." And all over the
world, wherever icy mountains reared themselves above inhabited lands,
the same story of destruction and death was told.

Then, after an interval, came the yet more awful invasion of the sea.

But few details can be given from lack of records. The Thames roared
backward on its course, and London and all central England were inundated.
A great bore of sea-water swept along the shores of the English Channel,
and bursting through the Skager Rack, covered the lower end of Sweden, and
rushed up the Gulf of Finland, burying St. Petersburg, and turning all
Western Russia, and the plains of Pomerania into a sea. The Netherlands
disappeared. The Atlantic poured through the narrow pass of the Strait of
Gibraltar, leaving only the Lion Rock visible above the waves.

At length the ocean found its way into the Desert of Sahara, large
areas of which had been reclaimed, and were inhabited by a considerable
population of prosperous farmers. Nowhere did the sudden coming of the
flood cause greater consternation than here--strange as that statement
may seem. The people had an undefined idea that they were protected by a
sort of barrier from any possible inundation.

It had taken so many years and such endless labor to introduce into the
Sahara sufficient water to transform its potentially rich soil into arable
land that the thought of any sudden superabundance of that element was far
from the minds of the industrious agriculturalists. They had heard of the
inundations caused by the melting of the mountain snows elsewhere, but
there were no snow-clad mountains near them to be feared.

Accordingly, when a great wave of water came rushing upon them, surmounted,
where it swept over yet unredeemed areas of the desert, by immense clouds
of whirling dust, that darkened the air and recalled the old days of the
simoom, they were taken completely by surprise. But as the water rose
higher they tried valiantly to escape. They were progressive people, and
many of them had aeros. Besides, two or three lines of aero expresses
crossed their country. All who could do so immediately embarked in
airships, some fleeing toward Europe, and others hovering about, gazing
in despair at the spreading waters beneath them.

As the invasion of the sea grew more and more serious, this flight by
airship became a common spectacle over all the lower-lying parts of Europe,
and in the British Isles. But, in the midst of it, the heavens opened their
flood-gates, as they had done in the New World, and then the aeros, flooded
with rain, and hurled about by contending blasts of wind, drooped,
fluttered, and fell by hundreds into the fast mounting waves. The nebula
was upon them!

In the meantime those who had provided arks of one kind or another, tried
desperately to get them safely afloat. All the vessels that succeeded in
leaving their wharves were packed with fugitives. Boats of every sort were
pressed into use, and the few that survived were soon floating over the
sites of the drowned homes of their occupants.

Before it was too late Yves de Beauxchamps and his friends launched their
submarine, and plunged into the bosom of the flood.




CHAPTER XIII

STRANGE FREAKS OF THE NEBULA


We return to follow the fortunes of Cosmo Versál's Ark.

After he had so providentially picked up the crazed billionaire, Amos
Blank, and his three companions, Cosmo ordered Captain Arms to bear away
southeastward, bidding farewell to the drowned shores of America, and
sailing directly over the lower part of Manhattan, and western Long
Island. The navigation was not easy, and if the Ark had not been a
marvelously buoyant vessel it would not long have survived. At the
beginning the heavy and continuous rain kept down the waves, and the
surface of the sea was comparatively smooth, but after a while a curious
phenomenon began to be noticed; immense billows would suddenly appear,
rushing upon the Ark now from one direction and now from another, canting
it over at a dangerous angle, and washing almost to the top of the huge
ellipsoid of the dome. At such times it was difficult for anybody to
maintain a footing, and there was great terror among the passengers. But
Cosmo, and stout Captain Arms, remained at their post, relieving one
another at frequent intervals, and never entrusting the sole charge of
the vessel to any of their lieutenants.

Cosmo Versál himself was puzzled to account for the origin of the mighty
billows, for it seemed impossible that they could be raised by the wind
notwithstanding the fact that it blew at times with hurricane force. But
at last the explanation came of itself.

Both Cosmo and the captain happened to be on the bridge together when they
saw ahead something that looked like an enormous column as black as ink,
standing upright on the surface of the water. A glance showed that it was
in swift motion, and, more than that, was approaching in a direct line
toward the Ark. In less than two minutes it was upon them.

The instant that it met the Ark a terrific roaring deafened them, and the
rounded front of the dome beneath their eyes disappeared under a deluge of
descending water so dense that the vision could not penetrate it. In
another half minute the great vessel seemed to have been driven to the
bottom of the sea. But for the peculiar construction of the shelter of the
bridge its occupants would have been drowned at their posts. As it was they
were soaked as if they had been plunged overboard. Impenetrable darkness
surrounded them.

But the buoyant vessel shook itself, rolled from side to side, and rose
with a staggering motion until it seemed to be poised on the summit of a
watery mountain. Immediately the complete darkness passed, the awful
downpour ceased, although the rain still fell in torrents, and the Ark
began to glide downward with sickening velocity, as if it were sliding
down a liquid slope.

It was a considerable time before the two men, clinging to the supports of
the bridge, were able to maintain their equilibrium sufficiently to render
it possible to utter a few connected words. As soon as he could speak with
reasonable comfort Cosmo exclaimed:

"Now I see what it is that causes the billows, but it is a phenomenon that
I should never have anticipated. It is all due to the nebula. Evidently
there are irregularities of some kind in its constitution which cause the
formation of almost solid masses of water in the atmosphere--suspended
lakes, as it were--which then plunge down in a body as if a hundred
thousand Niagaras were pouring together from the sky.

"These sudden accessions of water raise stupendous waves which sweep off
in every direction, and that explains the billows that we have
encountered."

"Well, this nebular navigation beats all my experience," said Captain Arms,
wiping the water out of his eyes. "I was struck by a waterspout once in
the Indian Ocean, and I thought that that capped the climax, but it was
only a catspaw to this. Give me a clear offing and I don't care how much
wind blows, but blow me if I want to get under any more lakes in the sky."

"We'll have to take whatever comes," returned Cosmo, "but I don't think
there is much danger of running directly into many of these downpours as
we did into this one. Now that we know what they are, we can, perhaps,
detect them long enough in advance to steer out of their way. Anyhow,
we've got a good vessel under our feet. Anything but an ark of levium
would have gone under for good, and if I had not covered the vessel with
the dome there would have been no chance for a soul in her."

As a matter of fact, the Ark did not encounter any more of the columns of
descending water, but the frequent billows that were met showed that they
were careering over the face of the swollen sea in every direction.

But there was another trouble of a different nature. The absence of sun
and stars deprived them of the ordinary means of discovering their place.
They could only make a rough guess as to the direction in which they were
going. The gyrostatic compasses gave them considerable assistance, and
they had perfect chronometers, but these latter could be of no use without
celestial observations of some kind.

At length Cosmo devised a means of obtaining observations that were of
sufficient value to partially serve their purpose. He found that while
the disk of the sun was completely hidden in the watery sky, yet it was
possible to determine its location by means of the varying intensity of
the light.

Where the sun was a concentrated glow appeared, shading gradually off on
all sides. With infinite pains Cosmo, assisted by the experience of the
captain, succeeded in determining the center of the maximum illumination,
and, assuming that to represent the true place of the sun, they got
something in the nature of observations for altitude and azimuth, and
Captain Arms even drew on his chart "Sumner lines" to determine the
position of the Ark, although he smiled at the thought of their absurd
inaccuracy. Still, it was the best they could do, and was better than
nothing at all.

They kept a log going also, although, as the captain pointed out, it was
not of much use to know how fast they were traveling, since they could not
know the precise direction, within a whole point of the compass, or perhaps
several points.

"Besides," he remarked, "what do we know of the currents? This is not the
old Atlantic. If I could feel the Gulf Stream I'd know whereabouts I was,
but these currents come from all directions, and a man might as well try
to navigate in a tub of boiling water."

"But we can, at least, keep working eastward," said Cosmo. "My idea is
first to make enough southing to get into the latitude of the Sahara
Desert, and then run directly east, so as to cross Africa where there are
no mountains, and where we shall be certain of having plenty of water under
our keel.

"Then, having got somewhere in the neighborhood of Suez, we can steer
down into the region of the Indian Ocean, and circle round south of the
Himalayas. I want to keep an eye on those mountains, and stay around the
place where they disappear, because that will be the first part of the
earth to emerge from the flood and it is there that we shall ultimately
make land."

"Well, we're averaging eight knots," said the captain, "and at that rate
we ought to be in the longitude of the African coast in about twenty days.
How high will the water stand then?"

"My gages show," replied Cosmo, "that the regular fall amounts to exactly
the same thing as at the beginning--two inches a minute. Of course the
spouts increase the amount locally, but I don't think that they add
materially to the general rise of the flood. Two inches per minute means
4,800 feet in twenty days. That'll be sufficient to make safe navigation
for us all the way across northern Africa. We'll have to be careful in
getting out into the Indian Ocean area, for there are mountains on both
sides that might give us trouble, but the higher ones will still be in
sight, and they will serve to indicate the location of the lower ranges
already submerged, but not covered deeply enough to afford safe going over
them."

"All right," said Captain Arms, "you're the commodore, but if we don't
hang our timbers on the Mountains of the Moon, or the Alps, or old Ararat,
I'm a porpoise. Why can't you keep circling round at a safe distance, in
the middle of the Atlantic, until all these reefs get a good depth of
water on 'em?"

"Because," Cosmo replied, "even if we keep right on now it will probably
take two months, allowing for delays in getting round dangerous places,
to come within sight of the Himalayas, and in two months the flood will
have risen nearly 15,000 feet, thus hiding many of the landmarks. If we
should hold off here a couple of months before starting eastward nothing
but the one highest peak on the globe would be left in sight by the time
we arrived there, and that wouldn't be anything more than a rock, so that
with the uncertainty of our navigation we might not be able to find it at
all. I must know the spot where Tibet sinks, and then manage to keep in
its neighborhood."

That ended the argument.

"Give me a safe port, with lights and bearings, and I'll undertake to hit
it anywhere in the two hemispheres, but blow me if I fancy steering for
the top of the world by dead reckoning, or no reckoning at all," grumbled
the captain.

At night, of course, they had not even the slight advantage that their
observations of the probable place of the sun gave them when it was above
the horizon. Then they had to go solely by the indications of the compass.
Still, they forged steadily ahead, and when they got into what they deemed
the proper latitude, they ran for the site of the drowned Sahara.

After about a week the billowing motion caused by the descent of the "lakes
in the sky" ceased entirely, to their great delight, but the lawless nebula
was now preparing another surprise for them.

On the ninth night after their departure from their lodgment on the
Palisades Cosmo Versál was sleeping in his bunk close by the bridge, where
he could be called in an instant, dreaming perhaps of the glories of the
new world that was to emerge out of the deluge, when he was abruptly
awakened by the voice of Captain Arms, who appeared to be laboring under
uncontrollable excitement.

"Tumble up quicker'n you ever did in your life!" he exclaimed, his big
brown beard wagging almost in Cosmo's face. "The flood's over!"

Cosmo sprang out of bed and pulled on his coat in a second.

"What do you mean?" he demanded.

"Look for yourself," said the captain, pointing overhead.

Cosmo Versál glanced up and saw the sky ablaze with stars! The rain had
entirely ceased. The surface of the sea was almost as smooth as glass,
though rising and falling slowly, with a long, rolling motion. The Ark
rode steadily, shivering, like an ocean liner, under the impulse of its
engines, and the sudden silence, succeeding the ceaseless roar of the
downpour, which had never been out of their ears from the start of the
voyage, seemed supernatural.

"When did this happen?" he demanded.

"It began not more than five minutes ago. I was just saying to myself that
we ought to be somewhere near the center of the old Atlantic as it used to
be, and wondering whether we had got our course laid right to go fairly
between the Canaries and the Cape de Verdes, for I didn't want to be
harpooned by Gogo or the Peak of Teneriffe, when all of a sudden there
came a lightening in the nor'east and the stars broke out there.

"I was so set aback that I didn't do anything for two or three minutes but
stare at the stars. Then the rain stopped and a curtain seemed to roll off
the sky, and in a minute more it was clear down to the horizon all around.
Then I got my wits together and ran to call you."

Cosmo glanced around and above, seeming to be as much astonished as the
captain had been. He rubbed his huge bald dome and looked all round again
before speaking. At last he said:

"It's the nebula again. There must be a hole in it."

"Its whole bottom's knocked out, I reckon," said the captain. "Maybe it's
run out of water--sort o' squeezed itself dry."

Cosmo shook his head.

"We are not yet in the heart of it," he said. "It is evident to me now that
what I took for the nucleus was only a close-coiled spiral, and we're run
out of that, but the worst is yet to come. When we strike the center, then
we'll catch it, and there'll be no more intermissions."

"How long will that be?" inquired Captain Arms.

"It may be a week, and it may be a month, though I hardly think it will be
so long as that. The earth is going about twelve miles a second--that's
more than a million miles a day--directly toward the center of the nebula.
It has taken ten days to go through the spiral that we have encountered,
making that about ten million miles thick. It's not likely that the gap
between this spiral and the nucleus of the nebula is more than thirty
million miles across, at the most; so you see we'll probably be in the
nucleus within a month, and possibly much less than a month."

Captain Arms took a chew of tobacco.

"We can get our bearings now," he remarked. "Look, there's the moon just
rising, and on my word, she is going to occult Aldebaran within an hour.
I'll get an observation for longitude, and another on Polaris for latitude.
No running on submerged mountains for us now."

The captain was as good as his word, and when his observations had been
made and the calculations completed he announced that the position of the
Ark was: Latitude, 16 degrees 10 minutes north; longitude, 42 degrees 28
minutes west.

"Lucky for us," he exclaimed, "that the sky cleared. If we'd kept on as
we were going we'd have struck the Cape de Verdes, and if that had
happened at night we'd probably have left our bones on a drowning volcano.
We ought to have been ten or twelve degrees farther north to make a safe
passage over the Sahara. What's the course now? Are you still for running
down the Himalaya mountains?"

"I'll decide later what to do," said Cosmo Versál. "Make your northing,
and then we'll cruise around a little and see what's best to be done."

When day came on, brilliant with sunshine, and the astonished passengers,
hurrying out of their bunks, crowded about the now opened gangways and the
portholes, which Cosmo had also ordered to be opened, and gazed with
delight upon the smooth blue sea, the utmost enthusiasm took possession of
them.

The flood was over!

They were sure of it, and they shook hands with one another and
congratulated themselves and hurrahed, and gave cheers for the Ark and
cheers for Cosmo Versál. Then they began to think of their drowned homes
and of their lost friends, and sadness followed joy. Cosmo was mobbed by
eager inquiries wherever he made his appearance.

Was it all over for good? Would the flood dry up in a few days? How long
would it be before New York would be free of water? Were they going right
back there? Did he think there was a chance that many had escaped in boats
and ships? Couldn't they pick up the survivors if they hurried back?

Cosmo tried to check the enthusiasm.

"It's too early for rejoicing," he assured them. "It's only a break in
the nebula. We've got a respite for a short time, but there's worse
coming. The drowning of the world will proceed. We are the only
survivors, except perhaps some of those who inhabited the highlands.
Everything less than 2,400 feet above the former level of the sea is now
under water. When the flood begins again it will keep on until it is
six miles deep over the old sea margins."

"Why not go back and try to rescue those who you say may have found
safety on the highlands?" asked one.

"I have chosen my company," he said, "and I had good reasons for the
choice I made. I have already added to the number, because simple humanity
compelled me, but I can take no more. The quantity of provisions aboard
the Ark is not greater than will be needed by ourselves. If the rest of
the world is drowned it is not my fault. I did my best to warn them.
Besides, we could do nothing in the way of rescue even if we should go
back for that purpose. We could not approach the submerged plateaus. We
would be aground before we got within sight of them."

These words went far to change the current of feeling among the
passengers. When they learned that there would be danger for themselves
in the course that had been proposed their humanity proved to be less
strong than their desire for self-preservation. Nevertheless, as we shall
see, the Ark ultimately went back to America, though not for any reason
that had yet been suggested.

Meanwhile the unexpected respite furnished by the sudden cessation of the
downpour from the sky had other important results, to which we now turn.




CHAPTER XIV

THE ESCAPE OF THE PRESIDENT


When Professor Abiel Pludder indited his savage response to Cosmo
Versál's invitation to become one of the regenerators of mankind by
embarking in the Ark, he was expressing his professional prejudice rather
than his intellectual conviction. As Cosmo had remarked, Pludder had a
good brain and great scientific acuteness, and, although he did not
believe in the nebular theory of a flood, and was obstinately opposed to
everything that was not altogether regular and according to recognized
authority in science, yet he could not shut his eyes to the fact that
something was going wrong in the machinery of the heavens. But it annoyed
him to find that his own explanations were always falsified by the event,
while Cosmo Versál seemed to have a superhuman foreglimpse of whatever
happened.

His pride would not allow him to recede from the position that he had
taken, but he could not free himself from a certain anxiety about the
future. After he had refused Cosmo Versál's invitation, the course of
events strengthened this anxiety. He found that the official
meteorologists were totally unable to account for the marvelous vagaries
of the weather.

Finally, when the news came of tremendous floods in the north, and of the
overflowing of Hudson Bay, he secretly determined to make some
preparations of his own. He still rejected the idea of a watery nebula,
but he began to think it possible that all the lowlands of the earth might
be overflowed by the sea, and by the melting of mountain snows and
glaciers, together with deluging rainfall. After what had passed, he could
not think of making any public confession of his change of heart, but his
sense of humanity compelled him to give confidential warning to his friends
that it would be well to be prepared to get on high ground at a moment's
notice.

He was on the point of issuing, but without his signature, an official
statement cautioning the public against unprecedented inundations, when the
first tidal wave arrived on the Atlantic coast and rendered any utterance
of that kind unnecessary. People's eyes were opened, and now they would
look out for themselves.

Pludder's private preparations amounted to no more than the securing of a
large express aero, in which, if the necessity for suddenly leaving
Washington should arise, he intended to take flight, together with
President Samson, who was his personal friend, and a number of other close
friends, with their families. He did not think that it would be necessary,
in any event, to go farther than the mountains of Virginia.

The rising of the sea, mounting higher at each return, at length convinced
him that the time had come to get away. Hundreds of air craft had already
departed westward, not only from Washington, but from New York,
Philadelphia, Baltimore, Boston, and other seaboard cities, before
Professor Pludder assembled his friends by telephone on the Capitol
grounds, where his aero was waiting.

The lower streets of the city were under water from the overflow of the
Potomac, which was backed up by the influx of the Atlantic into Chesapeake
Bay, and the most distressing scenes were enacted there, people fleeing in
the utmost disorder toward higher ground, carrying their children and some
of their household goods, and uttering doleful cries. Many, thinking that
the best way to escape, embarked in frail boats on the river, which was
running up-stream with frightful velocity, and rising perceptibly higher
every second. Most of these boats were immediately overturned or swamped.

If the start had been delayed but a little longer, the aero would have been
mobbed by the excited people, who uttered yells of disappointment and rage
when they saw it rise from its tower and sail over the city. It was the
last airship that left Washington, and it carried the last persons who
escaped from the national capital before the downpour from the atmosphere
began which put an end to all possibility of getting away.

There were on board, in addition to a crew of three, twenty-two persons.
These included President Samson, with his wife and three children, seven
other men with their families, making, together, sixteen persons, and
Professor Pludder, who had no family.

More because they wished to escape from the painful scenes beneath them
than because they deemed that there was any occasion for particular haste,
they started off at high speed, and it was probably lucky for them that
this speed was maintained after they had left Washington out of sight.
They rapidly approached the Blue Ridge in the neighborhood of Luray, and
Pludder was about to order a landing there as night was approaching, when
with great suddenness the sky filled with dense clouds and a tremendous
downpour began. This was the same phenomenon which has already been
described as following closely the attack at New York on Cosmo Versál's
Ark.

The aero, luckily, was one of the best type, and well covered, so that they
were protected from the terrible force of the rain, but in the tumult there
could be no more thought of descending. It would have been impossible to
make a landing in the midst of the storm and the pouring water, which
rushed in torrents down the mountainside. Professor Pludder was a brave man
and full of resources when driven into a corner. Being familiar with the
construction and management of aeros, for he had been educated as an
engineer, he now took charge of the airship.

Within twenty minutes after the sky had opened its batteries--for the rain
had almost the force of plunging shot--a mighty wind arose, and the aero,
pitching, tossing, and dipping like a mad thing, was driven with frightful
speed eastward. This wild rush continued for more than an hour. By this
time it was full night, and the pouring rain around them was as
impenetrable to the sight as a black wall.

They had their electric lamps inside, and their searchlights, but it was
impossible to tell where they were. Pludder turned the searchlight
downward, but he could not make out the features of the ground beneath
them. It is likely that they were driven at least as far as Chesapeake Bay,
and they may have passed directly over Washington.

At last, however, the wind slewed round, and began to blow with
undiminished violence from the northeast. Plunging and swerving, and
sometimes threatened with a complete somersault, the aero hurried away in
its crazy flight, while its unfortunate inmates clung to one another, and
held on by any object within reach, in the endeavor to keep from being
dashed against the metallic walls.

The crew of the aero were picked men, but no experience could have
prepared them for the work which they now had to do. Without the ready
brain of Professor Pludder to direct their efforts, and without his
personal exertions, their aerial ship would have been wrecked within a
quarter of an hour after the storm struck it. He seemed transformed into
another person. Hatless and coatless, and streaming with water, he worked
like a demon. He was ready at each emergency with some device which, under
his direction, had the effect of magic.

A hundred times the aero plunged for the ground, but was saved and turned
upward again just as it seemed on the point of striking. Up and down,
right and left, it ran and pitched and whirled, like a cork in a whirlpool.
Sometimes it actually skimmed the ground, plowing its way through a
torrent of rushing water, and yet it rose again and was saved from
destruction.

This terrible contest lasted another hour after the turning of the wind,
and then the latter died out. Relieved from its pressure, the aero ran on
with comparative ease. Professor Pludder, suspecting that they might now
be getting into a mountainous district, made every effort to keep the
craft at a high elevation, and this, notwithstanding the depressing force
of the rain, they succeeded in doing. After the dying out of the wind they
kept on, by the aid of their propellers, in the same direction in which it
had been driving them, because, in the circumstances, one way was as good
as another.

The terrible discomfort of the President and his companions in the cabin
of the aero was greatly relieved by the cessation of the wind, but still
they were in a most unfortunate state. The rain, driven by the fierce
blasts, had penetrated through every crevice, and they were drenched to
the skin. No one tried to speak, for it would have been almost impossible
to make oneself heard amid the uproar. They simply looked at one another
in dismay and prayed for safety.

Professor Pludder, not now compelled to spend every moment in the
management of the craft, entered the cabin occasionally, pressed the hand
of the President, smiled encouragingly on the women and children, and did
all he could, in pantomime, to restore some degree of confidence. Inside,
the lights were aglow, but outside it was as dark as pitch, except where
the broad finger of the searchlight, plunging into the mass of tumbling
water, glittered and flashed.

The awful night seemed endless, but at last a pale illumination appeared
in the air, and they knew that day had come. The spectacle of the skyey
deluge was now so terrible that it struck cold even to their already
benumbed hearts. The atmosphere seemed to have been turned into a mighty
cataract thundering down upon the whole face of the earth. Now that they
could see as well as hear, the miracle of the preservation of the aero
appeared incredible.

As the light slowly brightened, Professor Pludder, constantly on the
outlook, caught a glimpse of a dark, misty object ahead. It loomed up so
suddenly, and was already so close, that before he could sufficiently
alter the course of the aero, it struck with such violence as to crush
the forward end of the craft and break one of the aeroplanes. Everybody
was pitched headforemost, those inside falling on the flooring, while
Pludder and the three men of the crew were thrown out upon a mass of
rocks. All were more or less seriously injured, but none was killed or
totally disabled.

Pludder sprang to his feet, and, slipping and plunging amid the downpour,
managed to get back to the wreck and aid the President and the others to
get upon their feet.

"We're lodged on a mountain!" he yelled. "Stay inside, under the shelter
of the roof!"

The three men who, together with the professor, had been precipitated out
among the rocks, also scrambled in, and there they stood, or sat, the most
disconsolate and despairing group of human beings that ever the eye of an
overseeing Providence looked down upon.

The President presented the most pitiable sight of all. Like the rest,
his garments were sopping, his eyes were bloodshot, his face was ghastly,
and his tall silk hat, which he had jammed down upon his brow, had been
softened by the water and crushed by repeated blows into the form of a
closed accordion. Of the women and children it is needless to speak; no
description could convey an idea of their condition.

In these circumstances, the real strength of Professor Abiel Pludder's
mind was splendidly displayed. He did not lose his head, and he
comprehended the situation, and what it was necessary to do, in a flash.
He got out some provisions and distributed them to the company, in some
cases actually forcing them to eat. With his own hands he prepared coffee,
with the apparatus always carried by express aeros, and made them drink
it.

When all had thus been refreshed he approached President Samson and
shouted in his ear:

"We shall have to stay here until the downpour ceases. To guard against the
effects of a tempest, if one should arise, we must secure the aero in its
place. For that I need the aid of every man in the party. We have,
fortunately, struck in a spot on the mountain where we are out of the way
of the torrents of water that are pouring down through the ravines on
either side. We can make our lodgment secure, but we must go to work
immediately."

Stimulated by his example, the President and the others set to work, and
with great difficulty, for they had to guard their eyes and nostrils from
the driving rain, which, sometimes, in spite of their precautions, nearly
smothered them, they succeeded in fastening the aero to the rocks by means
of metallic cables taken from its stores. When this work was finished they
returned under the shelter of the cabin roof and lay down exhausted. So
worn out were they that all of them quickly fell into a troubled sleep.

It would be needless to relate in detail the sufferings, mental and
physical, that they underwent during the next ten days. While they were
hanging there on the mountain the seaboard cities of the world were
drowned, and Cosmo Versál's Ark departed on the remarkable voyage that has
been described in a former chapter. They had plenty of provisions, for the
aero had been well stored, but partly through precaution and partly because
of lack of appetite they ate sparingly. The electric generators of the aero
had not been injured in the wreck of the craft, and they were able to
supply themselves with sufficient heat, and with light inside the cabin at
night.

Once they had a strange visitor--a half-drowned bear, which had
struggled up the mountain from its den somewhere below--but that was the
only living creature beside themselves that they saw. After gazing
wistfully at the aero from the top of a rock the poor bear, fighting the
choking rain with its soaked paws, stumbled into one of the torrents that
poured furiously down on each side, and was swept from their sight.

Fortunately, the wind that they had anticipated did not come, but
frequently they saw or heard the roaring downpours of solid watery
columns like those that had so much astonished Cosmo Versál and Captain
Arms in the midst of the Atlantic, but none came very near them.

Professor Pludder ventured out from time to time, clambering a little way
up and down the projecting ridge of the mountain on which they were lodged,
and at length was able to assure his companions that they were on the
northwestern face of Mount Mitchell, the highest peak of the Appalachian
range. With the aid of his pocket aneroid, making allowance for the
effect of the lifting of the whole atmosphere by the flood, and summoning
his knowledge of the locality--for he had explored, in former years, all
the mountains in this region--he arrived at the conclusion that their
place of refuge was elevated about four thousand feet above the former
level of the sea.

At first their range of vision did not allow them to see the condition of
the valleys below them, but as the water crept higher it gradually came
into view. It rose steadily up the slopes beneath, which had already been
stripped of their covering of trees and vegetation by the force of the
descending torrents, until on the tenth day it had arrived almost within
reach. Since, as has just been said, they were four thousand feet above
the former level of the sea, it will be observed that the water must
have been rising much more rapidly than the measurements of Cosmo Versál
indicated. Its average rate of rise had been three instead of two inches
per minute, and the world was buried deeper than Cosmo thought. The cause
of his error will be explained later.

The consternation of the little party when they thus beheld the rapid
drowning of the world below them, and saw no possibility of escape for
themselves if the water continued to advance, as it evidently would do,
cannot be depicted. Some of them were driven insane, and were with
difficulty prevented by those who retained their senses from throwing
themselves into the flood.

Pludder was the only one who maintained a command over his nerves,
although he now at last _believed in the nebula_. He recognized that there
was no other possible explanation of the flood than that which Cosmo Versál
had offered long before it began. In his secret heart he had no expectation
of ultimate escape, yet he was strong enough to continue to encourage his
companions with hopes which he could not himself entertain.

When, after nightfall on the tenth day, the water began to lap the lower
parts of the aero, he was on the point of persuading the party to clamber
up the rocks in search of the shelter above, but as he stepped out of the
door of the cabin to reconnoiter the way, with the aid of the searchlight
which he had turned up along the ridge, he was astonished to find the rain
rapidly diminishing in force; and a few minutes later it ceased entirely,
and the stars shone out.

The sudden cessation of the roar upon the roof brought everybody to their
feet, and before Professor Pludder could communicate the good news all
were out under the sky, rejoicing and offering thanks for their
deliverance. The women were especially affected. They wept in one
another's arms, or convulsively clasped their children to their breasts.

At length the President found his voice.

"What has happened?" he asked.

Professor Pludder, with the new light that had come to him, was as ready
with an explanation as Cosmo Versál himself had been under similar
circumstances.

"We must have run out of the nebula."

"The nebula!" returned Mr. Samson in surprise. "Has there been a nebula,
then?"

"Without question," was the professor's answer. "Nothing but an encounter
with a watery nebula could have had such a result."

"But you always said----" began the President.

"Yes," Pludder broke in, "but one may be in error sometimes."

"Then, Cosmo Versál----"

"Let us not discuss Cosmo Versál," exclaimed Professor Pludder, with a
return of his old dictatorial manner.




CHAPTER XV

PROFESSOR PLUDDER'S DEVICE


Morning dawned brilliantly on Mount Mitchell and revealed to the
astonished eyes of the watchers an endless expanse of water, gleaming and
sparkling in the morning sunlight. It was a spectacle at once beautiful
and fearful, and calculated to make their hearts sink with pity no less
than with terror. But for a time they were distracted from the awful
thoughts which such a sight must inspire by anxiety concerning themselves.
They could not drive away the fear that, at any moment, the awful clouds
might return and the terrible downpour be resumed.

But Professor Pludder, whose comprehension of the cause of the deluge was
growing clearer the more he thought about it, did not share the anxiety
of the President and the others.

"The brightness of the sky," he said, "shows that there is no considerable
quantity of condensing vapor left in the atmosphere. If the earth has run
out of the nebula, that is likely to be the end of the thing. If there is
more of the nebulous matter in surrounding space we may miss it entirely,
or, if not, a long time would elapse before we came upon it.

"The gaps that exist in nebulae are millions of miles across, and the
earth would require days and weeks to go such distances, granting that it
were traveling in the proper direction. I think it altogether probable
that this nebula, which must be a small one as such things go, consists
of a single mass, and that, having traversed it, we are done with it. We
are out of our troubles."

"Well, hardly," said the President. "Here we are, prisoners on a mountain,
with no way of getting down, the whole land beneath being turned into a
sea. We can't stay here indefinitely. For how long a time are we
provisioned?"

"We have compressed food enough to last this party a month," replied
Professor Pludder; "that is to say, if we are sparing of it. For water we
cannot lack, since this that surrounds us is not salt, and if it were we
could manage to distil it. But, of course, when I said we were out of our
troubles I meant only that there was no longer any danger of being
swallowed up by the flood. It is true that we cannot think of remaining
here. We must get off."

"But how? Where can we go?"

Professor Pludder thought a long time before he answered this question.
Finally he said, measuring his words:

"The water is four thousand feet above the former level of the sea. There
is no land sufficiently lofty to rise above it this side of the Colorado
plateau."

"And how far is that?"

"Not less than eleven hundred miles in an air line."

The President shuddered.

"Then, all this vast country of ours from here to the feet of the Rocky
Mountains is now under water thousands of feet deep!"

"There can be no doubt of it. The Atlantic Coast States, the Southern
States, the Mississippi Valley, the region of the Great Lakes, and Canada
are now a part of the Atlantic Ocean."

"And all the great cities--gone! Merciful Father! What a thought!"

The President mused for a time, and gradually a frown came upon his brow.
He glanced at Professor Pludder with a singular look. Then his cheek
reddened, and an angry expression came into his eyes. Suddenly he turned
to the professor and said sternly:

"You said you did not wish to discuss Cosmo Versál. I should not think
you would! Who predicted this deluge? Did _you_?"

"I----" began Professor Pludder, taken aback by the President's manner.

"Oh, yes," interrupted the President, "I know what you would say. You
didn't predict it because you didn't see it coming. But _why_ didn't
you see it? What have we got observatories and scientific societies
for if they can't _see_ or _comprehend_ anything? Didn't Cosmo Versál
warn you? Didn't he tell you where to look, and what to look for? Didn't
he show you his proofs?"

"We thought they were fallacious," stammered Professor Pludder.

"You _thought_ they were fallacious--well, _were_ they fallacious? Does
this spectacle of a nation drowned look 'fallacious' to you? Why didn't
you study the matter until you understood it? Why did you issue
officially, and with my ignorant sanction--may God forgive me for my
blindness!--statement after statement, assuring the people that there was
no danger--statements that were even abusive toward him who alone should
have been heard?

"And yet, as now appears, you knew nothing about it. Millions upon millions
have perished through your obstinate opposition to the truth. They might
have saved themselves if they had been permitted to listen to the many
times reiterated warnings of Cosmo Versál.

"Oh, if _I_ had only listened to him, and issued a proclamation as he urged
me to do! But I followed _your_ advice--_you_, in whose learning and
pretended science I put blind faith! _Abiel Pludder, I would not have upon
my soul the weight that now rests on yours for all the wealth that the lost
world carried down into its watery grave!_"

As the President ceased speaking he turned away and sank upon a rock,
pressing his hands upon his throat to suppress the sobs that broke forth
despite his efforts. His form shook like an aspen.

The others crowded around excitedly, some of the women in hysterics, and
the men not knowing what to do or say. Professor Pludder, completely
overwhelmed by the suddenness and violence of the attack, went off by
himself and sat down with his head in his hands. After a while he arose
and approached the President, who had not moved from his place on the
rock.

"George," he said--they had known each other from boyhood--"I have made a
terrible mistake. And yet I was not alone in it. The majority of my
colleagues were of my opinion, as were all the learned societies of
Europe. No such thing as a watery nebula has ever been known to science.
It was inconceivable."

"Some of your colleagues did not think so," said the President, looking
up.

"But they were not really convinced, and they were aware that they were
flying in the face of all known laws."

"I am afraid," said the President dryly, "that science does not know all
the laws of the universe yet."

"I repeat," resumed Professor Pludder, "that I made a fearful mistake. I
have recognized the truth too late. I accept the awful burden of blame
that rests upon me, and I now wish to do everything in my power to
retrieve the consequences of my terrible error."

The President arose and grasped the professor's hand.

"Forgive me, Abiel," he said, with emotion, "if I have spoken too much in
the manner of a judge pronouncing sentence. I was overwhelmed by the
thought of the inconceivable calamity that has come upon us. I believe
that you acted conscientiously and according to your best lights, and it
is not for any mortal to judge you for an error thus committed. Let us
think only of what _we_ must do now."

"To that thought," responded Professor Pludder, returning the pressure of
the President's hand, "I shall devote all my energy. If I can save only
this little party I shall have done something in the way of atonement."

It was a deep humiliation for a man of Professor Pludder's proud and
uncompromising nature to confess that he had committed an error more
fearful in its consequences than had ever been laid at the door of a human
being, but Cosmo Versál had rightly judged him when he assured Joseph
Smith that Pludder was morally sound, and, in a scientific sense, had
the root of the matter in him. When his mental vision was clear, and
unclouded by prejudice, no one was more capable of high achievements.

He quickly proved his capacity now, as he had already proved it during
the preceding, adventures of the President's party. It was perfectly plain
to him that their only chance was in getting to Colorado at the earliest
possible moment. The eastern part of the continent was hopelessly buried,
and even on the high plains of the Middle West the fury of the downpour
might have spread universal disaster and destroyed nearly all the
vegetation; but, in any event, it was there alone that the means of
prolonging life could be sought.

With the problem squarely before his mind, he was not long in finding a
solution. His first step was to make a thorough examination of the aero,
with the hope that the damage that it had suffered might be reparable. He
had all the tools that would be needed, as it was the custom for express
aeros to carry a complete equipment for repairs; but unfortunately one of
the planes of the aero was wrecked beyond the possibility of repair. He
knew upon what delicate adjustments the safety of the modern airship
depended, and he did not dare undertake a voyage with a lame craft.

Then the idea occurred to him of trying to escape by water. The aero was
a machine of the very latest type, and made of levium, consequently it
would float better than wood.

If the opposition of shipbuilders, incited and backed by selfish interests,
had not prevented the employment of levium in marine construction, millions
of lives might now have been saved; but, as we have before said, only a
few experimental boats of levium had been made.

Moreover, like all aeros intended for long trips, this one had what was
called a "boat-bottom," intended to enable it to remain afloat with its
burden in case of an accidental fall into a large body of water. Pludder
saw that this fact would enable him to turn the wreck into a raft.

It would only be necessary to reshape the craft a little, and this was the
easier because the aero was put together in such a manner with screw-bolts
and nuts that it could be articulated or disarticulated as readily as a
watch. He had entire confidence in his engineering skill, and in the
ability of the three experienced men of the crew to aid him. He decided to
employ the planes for outriders, which would serve to increase the
buoyancy and stability.

As soon as he had completed his plan in his mind he explained his
intentions to the President. The latter and the other members of the party
were at first as much startled as surprised by the idea of embarking on a
voyage of eleven hundred miles in so questionable a craft, but Professor
Pludder assured them that everything would go well.

"But how about the propulsion?" asked Mr. Samson. "You can't depend on the
wind, and we've got no sails."

"I have thought that all out," said Pludder. "I shall use the engine, and
rearrange one of the aerial screws so that it will serve for a propeller.
I do not expect to get up any great speed, but if we can make only as much
as two miles an hour we shall arrive on the borders of the Colorado upland,
five thousand feet above sea, within about twenty-three days. We may be
able to do better than that."

Nobody felt much confidence in this scheme except its inventor, but it
appeared to be the only thing that could be done, and so they all fell to
work, each aiding as best he could, and after four days of hard work the
remarkable craft was ready for its adventurous voyage.

Professor Pludder had succeeded even better than he anticipated in
transforming one of the aerial screws into a propeller. Its original
situation was such that it naturally, as it were, fell into the proper
place when the "hull" was partly submerged, and, the blades being made of
concentric rows of small plates, there was no difficulty in reducing them
to a manageable size. The position of the engine did not need to be
shifted at all.

The "outriders," made up of the discarded planes, promised to serve their
purpose well, and the cabin remained for a comfortable "deck-house." A
rudder had been contrived by an alteration of the one which had served for
guiding the aero in its flights.

The water was close to their feet, and there was no great difficulty in
pushing the affair off the rocks and getting it afloat. The women and
children were first put aboard, and then the men scrambled in, and Pludder
set the motors going. The improvised propeller churned and spluttered,
but it did its work after a fashion, and, under a blue sky, in dazzling
sunshine, with a soft southerly breeze fanning the strange sea that
spread around them, they soon saw the bared rocks and deeply scored
flanks of Mount Mitchell receding behind them.

They were delighted to find that they were making, at the very start, no
less than three miles an hour. Pludder clapped his hands and exclaimed:

"This is capital! In but little over two weeks we shall be safe on the
great plains. I have good hope that many have survived there, and that we
shall find a plenty of everything needed. With the instruments that were
aboard the aero I can make observations to determine our position, and I
shall steer for the Pike's Peak region."

When the party had become accustomed to their situation, and had gained
confidence in their craft by observing how buoyantly it bore them, they
became almost cheerful in their demeanor. The children gradually lost all
fear, and, with the thoughtless joy of childhood in the pleasures and
wonders of the present moment, amused themselves in the cabin, and about
the deck, which had been surrounded with guard lines made of wire cable.

The water was almost waveless, and, if no storm should arise, there
appeared to be no reason for anxiety concerning the outcome of their
adventure. But as they drove slowly on over the submerged range of the
Great Smokies, and across the valleys of Eastern Tennessee, and then over
the Cumberland range, and so out above the lowlands, they could not keep
their thoughts from turning to what lay beneath that fearful ocean. And
occasionally something floated to the surface that wrenched their heart-
strings and caused them to avert their faces.

Professor Pludder kept them informed of their location. Now they were over
central Tennessee; now Nashville lay more than three thousand feet beneath
their keel; now they were crossing the valley of the Tennessee River; now
the great Mississippi was under them, hidden deep beneath the universal
flood; now they were over the highlands of southern Missouri; and now over
those of Kansas.

"George," said Professor Pludder one day, addressing the President, with
more emotion than was often to be detected in his voice, "would you like
to know what is beneath us now?"

"What is it, Abiel?"

"Our boyhood home--Wichita."

The President bowed his head upon his hands and groaned.

"Yes," continued Professor Pludder musingly, "there it lies, three thousand
feet deep. There is the Arkansas, along whose banks we used to play, with
its golden waters now mingling feebly with the mighty flood that covers
them. There is the schoolhouse and the sandy road where we ran races
barefoot in the hot summer dust. There is your father's house, and mine,
and the homes of all our early friends--and where are _they?_ Would to God
that I had not been so blind!"

"But there was another not so blind," said the President, with something
of the condemnatory manner of his former speech.

"I know it--I know it too well now," returned the professor. "But do not
condemn me, George, for what I did not foresee and could not help."

"I am sorry," said the President sadly, "that you have awakened these old
memories. But I do not condemn you, though I condemn your science--or your
lack of science. But we can do nothing. Let us speak of it no more."

The weather was wonderful, considering what had so recently occurred. No
clouds formed in the sky, there was only a gentle breeze stirring, at
night the heavens glittered with starry gems, and by day the sun shone so
hotly that awnings were spread over those whose duties required them to be
employed outside the shelter of the cabin. The improvised propeller and
rudder worked to admiration, and some days they made as much as eighty
miles in the twenty-four hours.

At length, on the fourteenth day of their strange voyage, they caught
sight of a curiously shaped "pike" that projected above the horizon far to
the west. At the same time they saw, not far away toward the north and
toward the south, a low line, like a sea-beach.

"We are getting into shallow water now," said Professor Pludder. "I have
been following the course of the Arkansas in order to be sure of a
sufficient depth, but now we must be very careful. We are close to the
site of Las Animas, which is surrounded with land rising four thousand
feet above sea-level. If we should get aground there would be no hope for
us. That pike in the distance is Pike's Peak."

"And what is that long line of beach that stretches on the north and
south?" asked the President.

"It is the topographic line of four thousand feet," replied the
professor.

"And we shall encounter it ahead?"

"Yes, it makes a curve about Las Animas, and then the land lies at an
average elevation of four thousand feet, until it takes another rise
beyond Pueblo."

"But we cannot sail across this half-submerged area," said the President.

"There are depressions," Professor Pludder responded, "and I hope to be
able to follow their traces until we reach land that still lies well
above the water."

Near nightfall they got so close to the "beach" that they could hear the
surf, not a thundering sound, but a soft, rippling wash of the slight
waves. The water about them was ruddy with thick sediment. Professor
Pludder did not dare to venture farther in the coming darkness, and he
dropped overboard two of the aero's grapples, which he had heavily
weighted and attached to wire cables. They took the ground at a depth of
only ten feet. There was no wind and no perceptible current, and so they
rode all night at anchor off this strangest of coasts.

At daybreak they lifted their anchors, and went in search of the
depressions of which the professor had spoken. So accurate was his
topographic knowledge and so great his skill, that late in the afternoon
they saw a tall chimney projecting above the water a little ahead.

"There's all that remains of Pueblo," said Professor Pludder.

They anchored again that night, and the next day, cautiously approaching
a bluff that arose precipitously from the water, their hearts were
gladdened by the sight of three men, standing on a bluff, excitedly
beckoning to them, and shouting at the top of their voices.




CHAPTER XVI

MUTINY IN THE ARK


We left Cosmo Versál and his arkful of the flower of mankind in the midst
of what was formerly the Atlantic Ocean, but which had now expanded over
so many millions of square miles that had once been the seats of vast
empires that to an eye looking at it with a telescope from Mars it would
have been unrecognizable.

All of eastern North America, all of South America to the feet of the
Andes, all but the highest mountains of Europe, nearly all of Africa,
except some of the highlands of the south, all of northern and
southwestern Asia, as well as the peninsula of India, all of China and
the adjacent lands and islands except the lofty peaks, the whole of
Australia, and the archipelagoes of the Pacific, had become parts of the
floor of a mighty ocean which rolled unbroken from pole to pole.

The Great Deep had resumed its ancient reign, and what was left of the
habitable globe presented to view only far separated islands and the
serrated tops of such ranges as the Alps, the Caucasus, the Himalayas,
and the Andes. The astonished inhabitants of the ocean depths now swam
over the ruins of great cities, and brushed with their fins the chiseled
capitals of columns that had supported the proudest structures of human
hands.

We have seen how the unexpected arrest of the flood had left Cosmo
uncertain as to the course that he ought to pursue. But he did not long
remain in doubt. He was sure that the downpour would be resumed after an
interval which at the most could not exceed a few weeks, and he resolved
to continue his way toward the future land of promise in Asia.

But he thought that he would have time to turn his prow in the direction
of Europe, for he felt a great desire to know by actual inspection to what
height the water had attained. He was certain that it could not be less
than he had estimated--the indications of his rain-gage had been too
unvarying to admit of doubt on that point--but he had no means of direct
measurement since he could not sound the tremendous depths beneath the
Ark.

After long meditation on the probable effects of the descending columns of
water which he had seen, he concluded that they might have added more
rapidly than he first supposed to the increase of the general level.
Besides, he reflected that there was no proof that the general downpour
might not have been greater over some parts of the earth than others. All
these doubts could be dissipated if he could get a good look at some lofty
mountain range, such as the Sierra Nevada of Spain, or the Pyrenees, or,
if he could venture within sight of them, the Alps.

So he said to Captain Arms:

"Steer for the coast of Europe."

The fine weather had produced a good effect upon the spirits of the
company. Not only were the ports and the gangways all open, but Cosmo
ordered the temporary removal of rows of adjustable plates on the sides of
the vessel, which transformed the broad outer gangways, running its whole
length, into delightful promenade decks. There, in cozy chairs, and
protected with rugs, the passengers sat, fanned by a refreshing breeze,
and dazzled by the splendor of the ocean.

They recalled, by their appearance, a shipload of summer tourists bound
for the wonders and pleasures of foreign parts. This likeness to a
pleasure cruise was heightened by the constant attentions of the crew,
under Cosmo's orders, who carried about refreshing drinks and lunches,
and conducted themselves like regular ocean "stewards."

It seemed impossible to believe that the world had been drowned, and some
almost persuaded themselves that the whole thing was a dream.

It must not be supposed that the thousand-odd persons who composed this
remarkable ship's company were so hard-hearted, so selfish, so forgetful,
so morally obtuse, that they never thought of the real horror of their
situation, and of the awful calamity that had overwhelmed so many millions
of their fellow-creatures. They thought of all that only too seriously
and in spite of themselves. The women especially were overwhelmed by it.
But they did not wish to dwell upon it, and Cosmo Versál did not wish that
they should.

At night he had musicians play in the grand saloon; he distributed books
among the passengers from a large library which he had selected; and at
last he had the stage set, and invited his friends, the players, to
entertain the company.

But he would have no plays but those of Shakespeare.

There were, probably, not half a dozen persons in the Ark who had ever
seen representations of these great dramas, and very few who had read them,
so that they had the advantage of complete novelty.

The play selected for the first representation was the tragedy of "King
Lear," a strange choice, it would, at first sight, seem, but Cosmo Versál
had a deep knowledge of human nature. He knew that only tragedy would be
endured there, and that it must be tragedy so profound and overmastering
that it would dominate the feelings of those who heard and beheld it. It
was the principle of immunizing therapeutics, where poison paralyzes
poison.

It came out as he anticipated. The audience, unused to such depth of
dramatic passion, for the plays to which they had been accustomed had been
far from the Shakespearian standard, was wholly absorbed in the
development of the tragedy. It was a complete revelation to them, and they
were carried out of themselves, and found in the sympathy awakened by this
heart-crushing spectacle of the acme of human woe an unconscious solace for
 their own moral anguish.

Afterward Cosmo put upon the stage "Hamlet," and "Othello," and "Macbeth,"
and "Coriolanus," and "Julius Caesar," but he avoided, for the present, the
less tragic dramas. And all of them, being new to the hearers, produced an
enormous effect.

On alternate nights he substituted music for the drama, and, as this was
confined to the most majestic productions of the great masters of the past,
many of whose works, like those of Shakespeare, had long been neglected if
not forgotten, their power over the spirits of the company was, perhaps,
even more pronounced.

Cosmo Versál was already beginning the education of his chosen band of
race regenerators, while he mused upon the wonders that the science of
eugenics would achieve after the world should have reemerged from the
waters.

One of the most singular effects of the music was that produced upon the
insane billionaire, Amos Blank. He had been confined in the room that
Cosmo had assigned to him, and was soothed, whenever Cosmo could find time
to visit him, with pretended acquiescence in his crazed notion that the
trip of the Ark was part of a scheme to "corner" the resources of the
world.

Cosmo persuaded him that the secret was unknown except to themselves, and
that it was essential to success that he (Blank) should remain in
retirement, and accordingly the latter expressed no desire to leave his
place of imprisonment, which he regarded as the headquarters of the
combination, passing hours in covering sheets of paper with columns of
figures, which he fancied represented the future profits of the
enterprise.

One night when a symphony of Beethoven was to be played, Cosmo led Amos
Blank through the crowded saloon and placed him near the musicians. He
resisted at first, and when he saw the crowd he drew back, exclaiming:

"What? Not overboard yet?"

But Cosmo soothed him with some whispered promise, and he took his seat,
glancing covertly around him. Then the instruments struck up, and
immediately fixed his attention. As the musical theme developed his eyes
gradually lost their wild look, and a softened expression took its place.
He sank lower in his seat, and rested his head upon his hand. His whole
soul seemed, at last, to be absorbed in the music. When it was finished
Blank was a changed man.

Then Cosmo clearly explained to him all that had happened.

After the first overwhelming effect of his reawakening to the realities
of his situation had passed, the billionaire was fully restored to all
his faculties. Henceforth he mingled with the other passengers and, as if
the change that had come over his spirit had had greater results than the
simple restoration of sanity, he became one of the most popular and useful
members of Cosmo Versál's family of pilgrims.

Among the other intellectual diversions which Cosmo provided was something
quite unique, due to his own mental bias. This consisted of "conferences,"
held in the grand saloon, afternoons, in the presence of the entire
company, at which the principal speakers were his two "speculative
geniuses," Costaké Theriade and Sir Wilfrid Athelstone. They did not care
very much for one another and each thought that the time allotted to the
other was wasted.

Theriade wished to talk continuously of the infinite energy stored up in
the atoms of matter, and of the illimitable power which the release of
that energy, by the system that he had all but completed, would place at
the disposition of man; and at the same time Sir Athelstone could with
difficulty be held in leash while he impatiently awaited an opportunity to
explain how excessively near he had arrived to the direct production of
protoplasm from inanimate matter, and the chemical control of living cells,
so that henceforth man could people or unpeople the earth as he liked.

One evening, when everybody not on duty was in bed, Captain Arms, with his
whiskers fairly bristling, entered Cosmo's cabin, where the latter was
dictating to Joseph Smith, and softly approaching his chief, with a furtive
glance round the room, stooped and whispered something in his ear. A
startled, though incredulous, expression appeared on Cosmo's face, and he
sprang to his feet, but before speaking he obeyed a sign from the captain
and told Smith to leave the room. Then he locked the door and returned to
his table, where he dropped into a chair, exclaiming in a guarded voice:

"Great Heaven, can this be possible! Have you not made a mistake?"

"No," returned the captain in a stridulous whisper, "I have made no
mistake. I'm absolutely sure. If something is not done instantly we are
lost!"

"This is terrible!" returned Cosmo, taking his head in his hands. "You
say it is that fellow Campo? I never liked his looks."

"He is the ringleader," replied the captain. "The first suspicion of what
he was up to came to me through an old sailor who has been with me on many
a voyage. He overheard Campo talking with another man and he listened.
Trust an old sea dog to use his ears and keep himself out of notice."

"And what did they say?"

"Enough to freeze the marrow in your bones! Campo proposed to begin by
throwing 'old Versál' and me into the sea, and then he said, with us gone,
and nobody but a lot of muddle-headed scientists to deal with, it would be
easy to take the ship; seize all the treasure in her; make everybody who
would not join the mutiny walk the plank, except the women, and steer for
some place where they could land and lead a jolly life.

"'You see,' says Campo, 'this flood is a fake. There ain't going to be no
more flood; it's only a shore wash. But there's been enough of it to fix
things all right for us. We've got the world in our fist! There's millions
of money aboard this ship, and there's plenty of female beauty, and we've
only got to reach out and take it.'"

Cosmo Versál's brow darkened as he listened, and a look that would have
cowed the mutineers if they could have seen it came into his eyes. His
hand nervously clutched a paper-knife which broke in his grasp, as he said
in a voice trembling with passion:

"They don't _know_ me--_you_ don't know me. Show me the proofs of this
conspiracy. Who are the others? Campo and his friend can't be alone."

"Alone!" exclaimed the captain, unconsciously raising his voice. "There's
a dozen as black-handed rascals in it as ever went unswung."

"Do you know them?"

"Jim Waters does."

"Why haven't you told me sooner? How long has it been going on?"

"Almost ever since the deluge stopped, I think; but it was only last night
that Waters got on the track of it, and only now that he told me. This
fellow that Waters heard Campo talking to is plainly a new recruit. I say
there are a dozen, because Waters has found out that number; but I don't
know but that there may be a hundred."

"How did these wretches get aboard?" demanded Cosmo, fiercely opening and
shutting his fists.

"Excuse me," said the captain, "but that is up to you to say."

"So it is," replied Cosmo, with a grim look; "and it's 'up to me' to say
what'll become of them. I see how it is, they must have got in with the
last lot that I took--under assumed names, very likely. I've been more
than once on the point of calling that man Campo up and questioning him. I
was surprised by his hangdog look the first time I saw him. But I have
been so busy."

"You'll have to get busy in another sense if you mean to save this ship
and your life," said the captain earnestly.

"So I shall. Are you armed? No? Then take these--and use 'em when I give
the word."

He handed the captain two heavy automatic pistols, and put a pair in his
own side pockets.

"Now," he continued, "the first thing is to make sure that we've got the
right men--and _all of them_. Call in Joseph Smith."

The captain went to the door, and as he approached it there was a knock.
He turned the key and cautiously opened a crack to look out. The door was
instantly slammed in his face, and six men rushed in, with Campo, a burly,
black-browed fellow, at their head. Three of the men threw the captain on
his back, and pinioned his hands before he could draw a weapon, while
Campo and the others sprang toward Cosmo Versál, Campo pointing a pistol
at his head.

"It's all up, Mr. Versál!" cried Campo with a sneer. "I'll take command of
this ship, and you'll go fish for nebulas."

Cosmo had one advantage; he was behind his desk, and it was a broad and
long one, and placed almost against the wall. They could not get at him
without getting round the desk. Campo did not fire, though he might have
shot Cosmo in his tracks; but evidently he was nourishing the idea of
making him walk the plank. With a sign he commanded his co-conspirators
to flank the desk at each end, while he kept Cosmo covered with his
pistol.

But with a lightning movement, Cosmo dropped under the desk, and, favored
by his slight form and his extreme agility, darted like a cat past Campo's
legs, and, almost before the latter could turn round, was out of the open
door. Campo fired at the retreating form, but the bullet went wide of the
mark. The pistol was practically noiseless, and the sound reached no ears
in the staterooms.

It happened that a switch controlling the lights in the gangway was on the
wall by Cosmo's door, and in passing he swiftly reached up and turned it
off. Thus he was in complete darkness, and when Campo darted out of the
door he could not see the fugitive. He could hear his footsteps, however,
and with two of his companions he rushed blindly after him, firing two or
three shots at random. But Cosmo had turned at the first cross passage,
and then at the next, this part of the Ark being a labyrinth of corridors,
and the pursuers quickly lost all trace of him.

Campo and his companions made their way back to Cosmo's cabin, where their
fellows were guarding Captain Arms. They found the switch in the passage
and turned on the light. They were almost immediately joined by several
other conspirators conducting Joseph Smith, bound and gagged. They held a
short consultation, and Campo, with many curses, declared that Cosmo
Versál must be caught at all hazards.

"The big-headed fiend!" he cried, gnashing his teeth. "Let me get my
grippers on him and I'll squelch him like a bug!"

They threw Joseph Smith into the room beside the helpless captain, after
taking the latter's pistols, locked the door from the outside, and
hurried off on their search. In the passages they encountered several
more of their friends. They now numbered fifteen, all armed. This may
seem a small number to undertake to capture the Ark; but it must be
remembered that among the thousand-odd inmates, exclusive of the crew,
only about one in three was a man, and the majority of these were
peaceable scientists who, it was to be presumed, had no fight in them.

At any rate, Campo, with the reckless courage of his kind, felt confident
that if he could get Cosmo Versál, with the captain and Joseph Smith, out
of the way, he could easily overmaster the others. He had not much fear
of the crew, for he knew that they were not armed, and he had succeeded
in winning over three of their number, the only ones he had thought
at all dangerous, because he had read their character. More than half
the crew were employed about the engines or on the animal deck, and most
of the others were simply stewards who would not stand before the pistols.

But, while the mutineers were hurriedly searching the corridors, Cosmo
had run straight to the bridge, where he found two of his men in charge,
and whence he sent an electric call to all the men employed in the
navigation of the vessel. They came running from various directions, but
a dozen of them were caught in the passages by the mutineers and bound
before they could comprehend what had happened. Seven, however, succeeded
in reaching the bridge, and among these was Jim Waters.

"There's a mutiny," said Cosmo. "We've got to fight for our lives. Have
you got arms?"

Not one had a weapon except Waters, who displayed a pistol half as long
as his arm.

"Here, Peterson, take this," said Cosmo, handing a pistol to one of the
two mariners who had been on the bridge. "They will be here in a minute.
If Campo had been a sailor, he'd have had possession here the first thing.
I'll turn off all lights."

With that he pressed a button which put out every lamp in the ark. But
there was a full moon, and they concealed themselves in the shadows.

Presently they heard the mutineers approaching, stumbling and cursing in
the darkness. Cosmo directed Peterson and Waters to place themselves at
his side, and told them to fire when he gave the word.

The next instant four men appeared crossing a moonlit place at the foot of
the steps on the outside of the dome.

"Wait," whispered Cosmo. "The pistols go at a pull. We can sweep down a
dozen in ten seconds. Let them all get in sight first."

Half a minute later there were twelve men climbing the steps and cautiously
looking up.

"Fire!" cried Cosmo, setting the example, and three streams of blue flame
pulsated from the bridge. The sound of the bullets striking made more
noise than the explosions.

Five or six of the men below fell, knocking down their comrades, and a
loud curse burst from the lips of Campo, who had a bullet through his arm.

The mutineers tumbled in a heap at the bottom, and instantly Cosmo,
switching on all lights, led the way down upon them. His men, who had no
arms, seized anything they could get their hands on that would serve to
strike a blow, and followed him.

The conspirators were overwhelmed by the suddenness and fury of the attack.

Four of them were killed outright and five were wounded, one so severely
that he survived only a few hours.

Cosmo's quick and overwhelming victory was due to the fact that the
mutineers, in mounting the steps, could not see him and his men in the
shadows, and when the automatic weapons, which fired three shots per
second by repeated pressure of the trigger, from a chamber containing
twenty-one cartridges, once opened on them they could do nothing in the
hail of missiles, especially when crowded together on the steps.

Campo was the only one who had any fight left in him. He struck Cosmo a
blow on the head that felled him, and then darted out upon the forepart
of the dome, running on the cleats, and made his way to the top.

Cosmo was on his feet in a second and rushing in pursuit, closely followed
by Jim Waters. The fugitive ran for the ratlines leading to the lookout on
the central mast. He climbed them like a squirrel, and the man in the
cro'nest, amazed at the sight below him, stared at the approaching
mutineer, unable to utter a cry. Campo, who, as the moonbeams showed, now
had a knife in his teeth, rapidly approached, and the lookout shrank in
terror. But before Campo could reach the cro'nest, a blinding light
dazzled his eyes. Cosmo had shouted an order to Peterson to run back to
the bridge and turn a searchlight upon the mast. Then Campo heard a
thundering voice below him:

"Take another step and I'll blow you into the sea!"

He glanced below, and saw Cosmo and Waters covering him with their
pistols.

"Not another step!" roared Cosmo again. "Come down, and I'll give you a
trial for your life."

Campo hesitated; but, seeing that he could be shot down, and finding a
gleam of hope in Cosmo's words, he turned and came slowly down. The
moment he touched the bottom he was seized by Waters and another man,
and, under Cosmo's directions, his hands were bound behind his back.

Ten minutes later the members of the crew who had been caught by the
mutineers in the gangways were all unbound, and then Cosmo broke open the
door of his cabin, the key having been lost or thrown away by Campo, and
the captain and Joseph Smith were released.

"Well, we've got 'em," said Cosmo grimly to the captain. "The mutiny is
at an end, and there'll never be another."

In the meantime many of the passengers had been aroused by the unaccustomed
noises, although the pistols had not made enough sound to be heard from
the place where they were fired. Nightcapped heads appeared on all sides,
and some, in scanty clothing, were wandering in the passageways, demanding
what the trouble was. Cosmo, the captain, and Joseph Smith reassured them,
saying that there was no danger, and that something had happened which
would be explained in the morning.

The prisoners--and the whole fifteen were finally captured--were locked up
in a strong room, and a surgeon was sent to dress their wounds. Cosmo
Versál and the captain resumed their accustomed places on the bridge,
where they talked over the affair, and Cosmo explained his plans for the
morrow.

"I'll give him his trial, as I promised," Cosmo said in conclusion, "and
you'll see what it will be. _Mutiny aboard this Ark!_" And he struck the
rail a violent blow with his fist.

The next morning directly after breakfast Cosmo called all passengers and
crew into the grand saloon, where many wondering looks were exchanged and
many puzzling questions asked. When the mutineers, with hands tied behind
their backs and their many bandages on arms and legs, were led in,
exclamations of astonishment were heard, and some of the timid ones shrank
away in fear.

Cosmo lost no time with preliminaries.

"These men," he said, taking his stand upon the platform, "have mutinied
and tried to capture the Ark. This fellow"--pointing to Campo--"was the
concocter and leader of the plot. He intended to throw me and Captain
Arms, and all of you whom he did not wish to retain for his fiendish
purposes, into the sea. But Heaven has delivered them into our hands. I
have promised them a trial, and they shall have it. But it will be a
trial in which justice shall not be cheated. I find that a moral poison
has stolen into this selected company, and I will eliminate it for once
and all."

The expressions of amazement and alarm redoubled in intensity.

"Professor Abel Able, Professor Jeremiah Moses, Sir Wilfrid Athelstone,
Costaké Theriade," Cosmo continued, "you will please come forward to act
as members of the jury, of which I name myself also a member. I shall be
both judge and juror here, but I will hear what the rest of you may have
to say."

The men named stepped forward with some evidences of embarrassment, and
Cosmo gravely gave them seats beside him. Then he commanded that the
prisoners should confront the jury, and, heavily guarded, they were led to
the front.

The brutishness of Campo's face had never struck the passengers who had
seen him before as it did now. He looked a veritable jailbird. At the same
time he was evidently in terror for his life. He muttered something which
nobody understood.

Cosmo, who had informed himself of all the circumstances from Waters, and
by privately questioning the others, had satisfied himself that the entire
scheme of the mutiny was of Campo's contrivance, and that they had been led
into it solely by his persuasion and threats, ordered Waters to speak. The
seaman told a straight story of what he had heard and seen. Cosmo himself
then related the events of the night. When he had finished he turned to
Campo and demanded what he had to say.

Campo again muttered under his breath, but made no attempt to defend
himself, simply saying:

"You promised me a trial."

"And haven't I given you a trial?" demanded Cosmo with flashing eyes. "You
thought you held the world in your grasp. It is _I_ that hold it in _my_
grasp, and _you_, too! You were going to make us 'walk the plank.' It is
_you_ who are going to walk it! Is that the verdict?" (turning to the four
jurymen).

Some of them nodded, some simply stared at Cosmo, surprised by the
vehemence of his manner.

"Enough," he said. "As to you," addressing the other prisoners, "you have
had your lesson; see that you don't forget it! Release them, and lead Campo
to the promenade deck."

Nobody thought that Cosmo would literally execute his threat to make the
mutineer walk the plank, but, as he had told Captain Arms, they didn't know
him. They were about to see that in Cosmo Versál they had not only a
prophet, a leader, and a judge, but an inexorable master also.

A plank was prepared and placed sloping from the rail.

"Walk!" said Cosmo firmly.

To everybody's surprise Campo, with blinded eyes, started immediately up
the plank, followed its full length with quick, unfaltering step, and
plunging from the end, disappeared in the sea.

Many had turned away, unable to look, but many also saw the tragedy to the
end. Then a profound sigh was heard from the whole company of the
spectators. As they turned away, talking in awed voices, they felt, as
never before, that the world had shrunk to the dimensions of the Ark, and
that Cosmo Versál was its dictator.

That same afternoon Cosmo arranged one of his "conferences," and nobody
dared to be absent, although all minds were yet too much excited to follow
the discussions which few could understand. But at length Costaké Theriade
concentrated their attention by a wild burst of eloquence about the wonders
of the inter-atomic forces. Sir Athelstone, unable to endure the applause
that greeted his rival, abruptly sprang to his feet, his round face red
with anger, and shouted:

"I say, you know, this is twaddle!"

"Will the Englishman interrupt not?" cried Theriade, with his eyes ablaze.
"Shall I project not the Sir Englishman to the feeshes?"

He looked as if he were about to try to execute his threat, and Sir
Athelstone assumed a boxing attitude; but before hostilities could begin a
loud shout from the deck, followed by cries and exclamations, caused
everybody to rush out of the saloon.

Those who succeeded in getting a glimpse over the shoulders of the members
of the crew, who were already lined up along the only portion of the
bulwarks available for seeing the part of the ocean on which attention
seemed to be fixed, stared open-mouthed at a round-backed mass of shining
metal, with a circular aperture on the top, the cover of which was canted
to one side, and there stood a man, waving a gold-laced red kepi, and
bowing and smiling with great civility.




CHAPTER XVII

THE _JULES VERNE_


The swell of the sea caused the strange-looking craft to rise and sink a
little, and sometimes the water ran bubbling all around the low rim of the
aperture, in the center of which the red-capped man stood, resting on some
invisible support, repeating his salutations and amicable smiles, and
balancing his body to the rocking of the waves with the unconscious
skill of a sailor.

The Ark was running slowly, but it would very soon have left the stranger
in its wake if he had not also been in motion. It was evident that the
object under his feet must be a submersible vessel of some kind, although
it was of a type which Captain Arms, standing beside Cosmo on the bridge,
declared that he had never set eyes on before. It lay so low in the water
that nothing could be seen of its motive machinery, but it kept its place
alongside the Ark with the ease of a dolphin, and gradually edged in closer
and closer.

When it was so near that he could be heard speaking in a voice hardly
raised above the ordinary pitch, the man, first again lifting his cap with
an easy gesture, addressed Cosmo Versál by name, using the English language
with a scarcely perceptible accent:

"M. Versál, I offer you my felicitations upon the magnificent appearance of
your Ark, and I present my compliments to the ladies and gentlemen of your
company."

And then he bowed once more to the passengers, who were almost crowding
each other over the side in their eagerness to both see and hear.

"Thank you," responded Cosmo, "but who are you?"

"Capitaine Yves de Beauxchamps, of the French army."

"Where's the navy, then?" blurted out Captain Arms.

De Beauxchamps glanced at the speaker a little disdainfully, and then
replied gravely:

"Alas! At the bottom of the sea--with all the other navies."

"And how have you escaped?" demanded Cosmo Versál.

"As you see, in a submersible."

"Can it be possible!" exclaimed Cosmo. "And you have been in the sea ever
since the beginning of the flood?"

"Since the first rise of the ocean on the coast at Brest."

"Have you no companions?"

"Six--in truth, seven."

"Astonishing!" said Cosmo Versál. "But I heard nothing of the preparation
of a submersible. In fact, the idea of such a thing never occurred to me.
You must have made your preparations secretly."

"We did. We did not share your certainty, M. Versál, concerning the arrival
of a deluge. Even when we embarked we were not sure that it would be more
than an affair of the coasts."

"But you must be on the point of starvation by this time. The flood has
only begun. This cessation is but for a time, while we are passing a gap in
the nebula. You will come aboard the Ark. I had chosen my company, but your
gallant escape, and the ability that you have shown, prove that you are
worthy to aid in the re-establishment of the race, and I have no doubt that
your companions are equally worthy."

The Frenchman bowed politely, and with a slight smile replied:

"I believe, M. Versál, that the _Jules Verne_ is as safe and comfortable,
and proportionately as well provisioned, as your Ark."

"So you call it the _Jules Verne?_" returned Cosmo, smiling in his turn.

"We were proud to give it that name, and its conduct has proved that it is
worthy of it."

"But you will surely come aboard and shake hands, and let us offer you a
little hospitality," said Cosmo.

"I should be extremely happy to pay my compliments to the ladies,"
responded De Beauxchamps, "but I must postpone that pleasure for the
present. In the meantime, however, I should be glad if you would lower a
landing stage, and permit me to send aboard the seventh member of our
party, who, I venture to think, may find the Ark a more comfortable abode
than our submersible."

"And who may that person be?"

"_The King of England._"

Exclamations of surprise and wonder were heard on all sides.

"Yes," resumed the Frenchman, "we picked up his majesty the first day after
the deluge began to descend from the sky."

"I will lower a ladder at once," Cosmo called out, and immediately ran down
to the lowest deck, commanding his men to make haste.

The _Jules Verne_ was skillfully brought close up to the side of the Ark,
so that the visible part of her rounded back was nearly in contact with the
bottom of the companion-ladder when it had been lowered. The sea was so
calm that there was little difficulty in executing this maneuver. De
Beauxchamps disappeared in the depths of the submersible, and after a few
minutes re-emerged into sight, supporting on his arm a stout, rather short
man, whose face, it was evident, had once been full and ruddy, but now it
was pale and worn.

"It is he!" exclaimed an English member of Cosmo's company to some of his
fellow-countrymen who had forced their way to the front.

_"It is the king!"_

And then occurred a singular thing, inspired by the marvelous circumstances
of this meeting of the sovereign of a drowned kingdom, upon the bosom of
the waters that had destroyed it, with the mere handful which remained
alive out of all the millions of his subjects.

These loyal Englishmen bared their heads (and there were three women among
them) and sang, with a pathos that surely the old hymn had never expressed
before, their national anthem: "God Save the King."

The effect was immense. Every head aboard the Ark was immediately
uncovered. De Beauxchamps removed his cap, and one or two bared heads could
be seen peering out of the interior of the submersible below him. As the
king was steadied across to the bottom of the companion-ladder, the voices
of the singers rose louder, and many of the other passengers, moved by
sympathy, or carried away by epidemic feeling, joined in the singing. Never
had any monarch a greeting like that! Its recipient was moved to the depths
of his soul, and but for the aid given him would have been unable to ascend
the swaying steps.

As he was assisted upon the deck, the song ceased and a great cheer broke
forth. There were tears in his eyes, and he trembled in every limb, when he
returned the welcoming pressure of Cosmo Versál's hand.

The moment he saw that the king was safely aboard the Ark, De Beauxchamps,
with a farewell salutation, disappeared into the interior of the _Jules
Verne_, and the submersible sank out of sight as gently as if it had been a
huge fish that had come to the top of the sea to take a look about.

After the sensation caused by the arrival of the English monarch aboard the
Ark had somewhat quieted down, and after his majesty had had an opportunity
to recover himself, Cosmo Versál invited his new guest to tell the story of
his escape. They were seated in Cosmo's cabin, and there were present
Joseph Smith, Professor Jeremiah Moses, Professor Abel Able, and Amos
Blank, beside several other members of the ship's company, including two of
the loyal Englishmen who quite naturally had been the first to strike up
the national anthem on seeing their rescued king.

Richard Edward, or Richard IV as he was officially entitled, was one of the
best kings England ever had. He was popular not only because of his almost
democratic manners and the simplicity of his life, but more because he was
a great lover of peace. We have already seen how he was chosen, solely on
that account, to be of the number of the rulers invited to go in the Ark.
He had not even replied to Cosmo's invitation, but that was simply because,
like everybody about him in whom he placed confidence, he regarded Cosmo
Versál as a mere mountebank, and thought that there was no more danger of a
flood that would cover the earth than of the fall of the moon out of the
sky.

Before responding to Cosmo's request he made a gracious reference to the
indifference with which he had formerly treated his present host.

"I am sorry, Mr. Versál," he said, with a deprecatory smile, "that I did
not sooner recognize the fact that your knowledge surpassed that of my
scientific advisers."

"Your majesty was not alone," replied Cosmo gravely, turning with his
finger a small globe that stood on his desk. "From all these deep-sunken
continents" (waving his hand toward the globe), "if the voices once heard
there could now speak, there would arise a mighty sound of lament for that
great error."

The king looked at him with an expression of surprise. He glanced from
Cosmo's diminutive figure to his great overhanging brow, marked with the
lines of thought, and a look of instinctive deference came into his eyes.

"But," continued Cosmo Versál, "it is bootless to speak of these things
now. I beg that your majesty will condescend to enlighten us concerning the
fate of that great kingdom, of ancient renown, over which you so worthily
reigned."

An expression of deepest pain passed across the face of Richard Edward. For
some moments he remained buried in a mournful silence, and many sighs came
from his breast. All looked at him with profound commiseration. At last he
raised his head, and said, sorrowfully and brokenly:

"My kingdom is drowned--my subjects have perished, almost to the last soul
--my family, my gracious consort, my children--all, all--gone!"

Here he broke down, and could speak no more. Not a word was heard, for a
time in the room, and the two Englishmen present wept with their
unfortunate king.

Cosmo Versál was no less deeply moved than the others. He sat, for a while,
in complete silence. Then he arose and, going to the king, put his hand
upon his shoulder, and talked to him long, in a low, consoling voice. At
last the broken-spirited monarch was able to suppress his emotions
sufficiently to recite, but with many interruptions while he remastered
his feelings, the story of his woes and of his marvelous escape.

"Sir Francis Brook," he said, "prepared a barge, when the water invaded
London, and in that barge we escaped--her royal majesty, our children, and
a number of members of the royal household. The barge was the only vessel
of levium that existed in England. Sir Francis had furnished and
provisioned it well, and we did not think that it would be necessary to go
farther than to some high point in the interior. Sir Francis was of the
opinion that Wales would afford a secure refuge.

"It was a terrible thing to see the drowning of London, the sweeping of the
awful bore that came up the Thames from the sea, the shipping wrecked by
the tearing waves, the swirl of the fast-rising water round the immense
basin in which the city lay, the downfall of the great buildings--
Westminster Abbey was one of the first that succumbed--the overturned
boats, and even great vessels floating on their sides, or bottom up, the
awful spectacle of the bodies of the drowned tossing in the waves--all
these sights were before our horrified eyes while the vast eddy swept us
round and round until the water rose so high that we were driven off
toward the southwest.

"That we should have escaped at all was a miracle of miracles. It was the
wonderful buoyancy of the levium barge that saved us. But the terrors of
that scene can never fade from my memory. And the fearful sufferings of
the queen! And our children--but I _cannot_ go on with this!"

"Calm yourself, your majesty," said Cosmo sympathetically. "The whole
world has suffered with you. If we are spared and are yet alive, it is
through the hand of Providence--to which all of us must bow."

"We must have passed over Surrey and Hampshire," the king resumed, "the
invasion of the sea having buried the hills."

"I am surprised at that," said Cosmo. "I did not think that the sea had
anywhere attained so great an elevation before the nebula condensed. At
New York the complete drowning of the city did not occur until the
downpour from the sky began."

"Oh! that deluge from the heavens!" cried the king. "What we had suffered
before seemed but little in comparison. It came upon us after night;
and the absolute darkness, the awful roaring, the terrific force of the
falling water, the sense of suffocation, the rapid filling of the barge
until the water was about our necks--these things drove us wild with
despair.

"I tried to sustain my poor queen in my arms, but she struggled to seize
the children and hold them above the water, and in her efforts she escaped
from my hands, and henceforth I could find her no more. I stumbled about,
but it was impossible to see; it was impossible to hear. At last I fell
unconscious face downward, as it afterward appeared, upon a kind of bench
at the rear end of the barge, which was covered with a narrow metallic
roofing, and raised above the level of the bulwarks. It was there that I
had tried to shelter the queen and the children.

"In some way I must have become lodged there, under the awning, in such a
position that the pitching of the barge failed to throw me off. I never
regained consciousness until I heard a voice shouting in my ear, and felt
some one pulling me, and when I had recovered my senses, I found myself in
 the submersible."

"And all your companions were gone?" asked Cosmo, in a voice shaking with
pity.

"Yes, oh, Lord! All! They had been swept overboard by the waves--and would
that I had gone with them!"

The poor king broke down again and sobbed. After a long pause Cosmo asked
gently:

"Did the Frenchman tell you how he came upon the barge?"

"He said that in rising to the surface to find out the state of things
there the submersible came up directly under the barge, canting it in such
a way that I was rolled out and he caught me as I was swept close to the
opening."

"But how was it that the downpour, entering the submersible, when the cover
was removed, did not fill it with water?"

"He had the cover so arranged that it served as an almost complete
protection from the rain. Some water did enter, but not much."

"A wonderful man, that Frenchman," said Cosmo. "He would be an acquisition
for me. What did he say his name was? Oh, yes, De Beauxchamps--I'll make a
note of that. I shouldn't wonder if we heard of him again."

Cosmo Versál was destined to encounter Yves de Beauxchamps and his
wonderful submersible _Jules Verne_ sooner, and under more dramatic
circumstances than he probably anticipated.




CHAPTER XVIII

NAVIGATING OVER DROWNED EUROPE


After the English king had so strangely become a member of its company the
Ark resumed its course in the direction of what had once been Europe. The
spot where the meeting with the _Jules Verne_ had occurred was west of Cape
Finisterre and, according to the calculations of Captain Arms, in longitude
fifteen degrees four minutes west; latitude forty-four degrees nine minutes
north.

Cosmo decided to run into the Bay of Biscay, skirting its southern coast in
order to get a view of the Cantabrian Mountains, many of whose peaks, he
thought, ought still to lie well above the level of the water.

"There are the Peaks of Europa," said Captain Arms, "which lie less than
twenty miles directly back from the coast. The highest point is eight
thousand six hundred and seventy feet above sea level, or what used to be
sea level. We could get near enough to it, without any danger, to see how
high the water goes."

"Do you know the locality?" demanded Cosmo.

"As well as I know a compass-card!" exclaimed the captain. "I've seen the
Europa peaks a hundred times. I was wrecked once on that coast, and being
of an inquiring disposition, I took the opportunity to go up into the range
and see the old mines--and a curious sight it was, too. But the most
curious sight of all was the shepherdesses of Tresvido, dressed just like
the men, in homespun breeches that never wore out. You'd meet 'em anywhere
on the slopes of the Pico del Ferro, cruising about with their flocks. And
the cheese that they made! There never was any such cheese!"

"Well, if you know the place so well," said Cosmo, "steer for it as fast as
you can. I'm curious to find out just how high this flood has gone, up to
the present moment."

"Maybe we can rescue a shepherdess," returned the captain, chuckling.
"She'd be an ornament to your new Garden of Eden."

They kept on until, as they approached longitude five degrees west, they
began to get glimpses of the mountains of northern Spain. The coast was all
under deep water, and also the foothills and lower ranges, but some of the
peaks could be made out far inland. At length, by cautious navigation,
Captain Arms got the vessel quite close to the old shore line of the
Asturias, and then he recognized the Europa peaks.

"There they are," he cried. "I'd know 'em if they'd emigrated to the middle
of Africa. There's the old Torre de Cerredo and the Peńa Santa."

"How high did you say the main peak is?" asked Cosmo.

"She's eight thousand six hundred and seventy feet."

"From your knowledge of the coast, do you think it safe to run in closer?"

"Yes, if you're sure the water is not less than two thousand four hundred
feet above the old level we can get near enough to see the water-line on
the peaks, from the cro'nest, which is two hundred feet high."

"Go ahead, then."

They got closer than they had imagined possible, so close that, from the
highest lookout on the Ark, they were able with their telescopes to see
very clearly where the water washed the barren mountainsides at what seemed
to be a stupendous elevation.

"I'm sorry about your shepherdesses," said Cosmo, smiling. "I don't think
you'd find any there to rescue if you could get to them. They must all
have been lost in the torrents that poured down those mountains."

"More's the pity," said Captain Arms. "That was a fine lot of women.
There'll be no more cheese like what they made at Tresvido."

Cosmo inquired if the captain's acquaintance with the topography of the
range enabled him to say how high that water was. The captain, after long
inspection, declared that he felt sure that it was not less than four
thousand feet above the old coast line.

"Then," said Cosmo, "if you're right about the elevation of what you call
the Torre de Cerredo there must be four thousand six hundred and seventy
feet of its upper part still out of water. We'll see if that is so."

Cosmo made the measurements with instruments, and announced that the result
showed the substantial accuracy of Captain Arms's guess.

"I suspected as much," he muttered. "Those tremendous downpours, which may
have been worse elsewhere than where we encountered them, have increased
the rise nearly seventy per cent, above what my gages indicated. Now that I
know this," he continued, addressing the captain: "I'll change the course
of the Ark. I'm anxious to get into the Indian Ocean as soon as possible.
It would be a great waste of time to go back in order to cross the Sahara,
and with this increase of level it isn't necessary. We'll just set out
across southern France, keeping along north of the Pyrenees, and so down
into the region of the Mediterranean."

Captain Arms was astonished by the boldness of this suggestion, and at
first he strongly objected to their taking such a course.

"There's some pretty high ground in southern France," he said. "There's the
Cevennes Mountains, which approach a good long way toward the Pyrenees. Are
you sure the depth of water is the same everywhere?"

"What a question for an old mariner to ask!" returned Cosmo. "Don't you
know that the level of the sea is the same everywhere? The flood doesn't
make any difference. It seeks its level like any other water."

"But it may be risky steering between those mountains," persisted the
captain.

"Nonsense! As long as the sky is clear you can get good observations, and
you ought to be navigator enough not to run on a mountain."

Cosmo Versál, as usual, was unalterable in his resolution--he only changed
when he had reasons of his own--and the course of the Ark was laid,
accordingly, for the old French coast of the Landes, so low that it was now
covered with nearly four thousand feet of water. The feelings of the
passengers were deeply stirred when they learned that they were actually
sailing over buried Europe, and they gazed in astonishment at the water
beneath them, peering down into it as if they sought to discover the
dreadful secrets that it hid, and talking excitedly in a dozen languages.

The Ark progressed slowly, making not more than five or six knots, and on
the second day after they dropped the Peńas de Europa they were passing
along the northern flank of the Pyrenees and over the basin in which had
lain the beautiful city of Pau. The view of the Pyrenees from this point
had always been celebrated before the deluge as one of the most remarkable
in the world.

Now it had lost its beauty, but gained in spectacular grandeur. All of
France, as far as the eye extended, was a sea, with long oceanic swells
slowly undulating its surface. This sea abruptly came to an end where it
met the mountains, which formed for it a coast unlike any that the hundreds
of eyes which wonderingly surveyed it from the Ark had ever beheld.

Beyond the drowned vales and submerged ranges, which they knew lay beneath
the watery floor, before them, rose the heads of the Pic du Midi, the Pic
de Ger, the Pic de Bigorre, the Massif du Gabizos, the Pic Monné, and
dozens of other famous eminences, towering in broken ranks like the
bearskins of a "forlorn hope," resisting to the last, in pictures of
old-time battles.

Here, owing to the configuration of the drowned land it was possible for
the Ark to approach quite close to some of the wading mountains, and Cosmo
seized the opportunity to make a new measure of the height of the flood,
which he found to be surely not less than his former estimates had shown.

Surveying with telescopes the immense shoulders of the Monné, the Viscos,
the d'Ardiden, and the nearer heights, when they were floating above the
valley of Lourdes, Cosmo and the captain saw the terrible effects that had
been produced by the torrents of rain, which had stripped off the
vegetation whose green robe had been the glory of the high Pyrenees on the
French side.

Presently their attention was arrested by some moving objects, and at a
second glance they perceived that these were human beings.

"Good Heaven!" exclaimed Cosmo Versál. "There are survivors here. They have
climbed the mountains, and found shelter among the rocks. I should not have
thought it possible."

"And there are women among them," said Captain Arms, lowering his
telescope. "You will not leave them there!"

"But what can I do?"

"Lower away the boats," replied the captain. "We've got plenty of them."

"There may be thousands there," returned Cosmo, musing. "I can't take them
all."

"Then take as many as you can. By gad, sir, _I'll_ not leave 'em!"

By this time some of the passengers who had powerful glasses had discovered
the refugees on the distant heights, and great excitement spread throughout
the Ark. Cries arose from all parts of the vessel:

"Rescue them!" "Go to their aid!" "Don't let them perish!"

Cosmo Versál was in a terrible quandary. He was by no means without
humanity, and was capable of deep and sympathetic feeling, as we have seen,
but he already had as many persons in the Ark as he thought ought to be
taken, considering the provision that had been made, and, besides, he could
not throw off, at once, his original conviction of the necessity of
carefully choosing his companions. He remained for a long time buried in
thought, while the captain fumed with impatience and at last declared that
if Cosmo did not give the order to lower away the boats he would do it
himself.

At length Cosmo, yielding rather to his own humane feelings than to the
urging of others, consented to make the experiment. Half a dozen levium
launches were quickly lowered and sent off, while the Ark, with slowed
engines, remained describing a circle as near the mountains as it was safe
to go. Cosmo himself embarked in the leading boat.

The powerful motors of the launches carried them rapidly to the high slopes
where the unfortunates had sought refuge, and as they approached, and the
poor fugitives saw that deliverance was at hand, they began to shout, and
cheer, and cry, and many of them fell on their knees upon the rocks and
stretched their hands toward the heavens.

The launches were compelled to move with great caution when they got near
the ragged sides of the submerged mountains (it was the Peyre Dufau on
which the people had taken refuge), but the men aboard them were determined
to effect the rescue, and they regarded no peril too closely. At last
Cosmo's launch found a safe landing, and the others quickly followed it.

When Cosmo sprang out on a flat rock a crowd of men, women, and children,
weeping, crying, sobbing, and uttering prayers and blessings, instantly
surrounded him. Some wrung his hands in an ecstasy of joy, some embraced
him, some dropped on their knees before him and sought to kiss his hands.
Cosmo could not restrain his tears, and the crews of the launches were
equally affected.

Many of these people could only speak the patois of the mountains, but some
were refugees from the resorts in the valleys below, and among these were
two English tourists who had been caught among the mountains by the sudden
rising of the flood. They exhibited comparative _sang froid_, and served as
spokesmen for the others.

"Bah Jove!" exclaimed one of them, "but you're welcome, you know! This has
been a demnition close call! But what kind of a craft have you got out
there?"

"I'm Cosmo Versál."

"Then that's the Ark we've heard about! 'Pon honor, I should have
recognized you, for I've seen your picture often enough. You've come to
take us off, I suppose?"

"Certainly," replied Cosmo. "How many are there?"

"All that you see here; about a hundred, I should say. No doubt there are
others on the mountains round. There must have been a thousand of us when
we started, but most of them perished, overcome by the downpour, or swept
away by the torrents. Lord Swansdown (indicating his companion, who bowed
gravely and stiffly) and myself--I'm Edward Whistlington--set out to walk
over the Pyrenees from end to end, after the excitement about the great
darkness died out, and we got as far as the Marboré, and then running down
to Gavarnie we heard news of the sea rising, but we didn't give too much
credit to that, and afterward, keeping up in the heights, we didn't hear
even a rumor from the world below.

"The sky opened on us like a broadside from an aerial squadron, and how we
ever managed to get here I'm sure I can hardly tell. We were actually
_carried_ down the mountainsides by the water, and how it failed to drown
us will be an everlasting mystery. Somehow, we found ourselves among these
people, who were trying to go _up_, assuring us that there was nothing
but water below. And at last we discovered some sort of shelter here--and
here we've been ever since."

"You cannot have had much to eat," said Cosmo.

"Not _too_ much, I assure you," replied the Englishman, with a melancholy
smile. "But these people shared with us what little they had, or could
find--anything and everything that was eatable. They're a devilish fine
lot, I tell you!

"When the terrible rain suddenly ceased and the sky cleared," he resumed,
"we managed to get dry, after a day or two, and since then we've been
chewing leather until there isn't a shoe or a belt left. We thought at
first of trying to build rafts--but then where could we go? It wasn't any
use to sail out over a drowned country, with nothing in sight but the
mountains around us, which looked no better than the one we were barely
existing on."

"Then I must get you aboard the Ark before you starve," said Cosmo.

"Many have died of starvation already," returned Whistlington. "You can't
get us off a moment too quick."

Cosmo Versál had by this time freed himself of every trace of the
reluctance which he had at first felt to increasing the size of his ship's
company by adding recruits picked up at random. His sympathies were
thoroughly aroused, and while he hastened the loading and departure of the
launches, he asked the Englishmen who, with the impassive endurance of
their race, stayed behind to the last, whether they thought that there were
other refugees on the mountains whom they could reach.

"I dare say there are thousands of the poor devils on these peaks around
us, wandering among the rocks," replied Edward Whistlington, "but I fancy
you couldn't reach 'em."

"If I see any I'll try," returned Cosmo, sweeping with his powerful
telescope all the mountain flanks within view.

At last, on the slopes of the lofty Mont Aigu across the submerged valley
toward the south, he caught sight of several human figures, one of which
was plainly trying to make signals, probably to attract attention from the
Ark. Immediately, with the Englishmen and the remainder of those who had
been found on the Peyre Dufau, he hastened in his launch to the rescue.

They found four men and three women, who had escaped from the narrow valley
containing the _bains de Gazost_, and who were in the last stages of
starvation. These were taken aboard, and then, no more being in sight,
Cosmo returned to the Ark, where the other launches had already arrived.

And these were the last that were rescued from the mighty range of the
Pyrenees, in whose deep valleys had lain the famous resorts of Cauterets,
the Eaux Bonnes, the Eaux Chaudes, the Bagničres de Luchon, the Bagničres
de Bigorre, and a score of others. No doubt, as the Englishmen had said,
thousands had managed to climb the mountains, but none could now be seen,
and those who may have been there were left to perish.

There was great excitement in the Ark on the arrival of the refugees. The
passengers overwhelmed them with kind attentions, and when they had
sufficiently recovered, listened with wonder and the deepest sympathy to
their exciting tales of suffering and terror.

Lord Swansdown and Edward Whistlington were amazed to find their king
aboard the Ark, and the English members of the company soon formed a sort
of family party, presided over by the unfortunate monarch. The rescued
persons numbered, in all, one hundred and six.

The voyage of the Ark was now resumed, skirting the Pyrenees, but at an
increasing distance. Finally Captain Arms announced that, according to his
observations, they were passing over the site of the ancient and populous
city of Toulouse. This recalled to Cosmo Versál's memory the beautiful
scenes of the fair and rich land that lay so deep under the Ark, and he
began to talk with the captain about the glories of its history.

He spoke of the last great conqueror that the world had known, Napoleon,
and was discussing his marvelous career, and referring to the fact that he
had died on a rock in the midst of that very ocean which had now swallowed
up all the scenes of his conquests, when the lookout telephoned down that
there was something visible on the water ahead.

In a little while they saw it--a small moving object, which rapidly
approached the Ark. As it drew nearer both exclaimed at once:

"The _Jules Verne!_"

There could be no mistaking it. It was riding with its back just above the
level of the sea; the French flag was fluttering from a small mast, and
already they could perceive the form of De Beauxchamps, standing in his old
attitude, with his feet below the rim of the circular opening at the top.
Cosmo ordered the Stars and Stripes to be displayed in salute, and, greatly
pleased over the encounter, hurried below and had the companion-ladder made
ready.

"He's got to come aboard this time, anyhow!" he exclaimed. "I'll take no
refusal. I want to know that fellow better."

But this time De Beauxchamps had no thought of refusing the hospitalities
of the Ark. As soon as he was within hearing he called out:

"My salutations to M. Versál and his charming fellow-voyagers. May I be
permitted to come aboard and present myself in person? I have something
deeply interesting to tell."

Everybody in the Ark who could find a standing-place was watching the
_Jules Verne_ and trying to catch a glimpse of its gallant captain, and to
hear what he said; and the moment his request was preferred a babel of
voices arose, amid which could be distinguished such exclamations as:

"Let him come!" "A fine fellow!" "Welcome, De Beauxchamps!" "Hurrah for the
_Jules Verne!_"

King Richard was in the fore rank of the spectators, waving his hand to his
preserver.

"Certainly you can come aboard," cried Cosmo heartily, at the same time
hastening the preparations for lowering the ladder. "We are all glad to see
you. And bring your companions along with you."



CHAPTER XIX

TO PARIS UNDER THE SEA


De Beauxchamps accepted Cosmo Versál's invitation to bring his
companions with him into the Ark. The submersible was safely moored
alongside, where she rode easily in company with the larger vessel, and
all mounted the companion-ladder. The Frenchman's six companions were
dressed, like himself, in the uniform of the army.

"Curious," muttered Captain Arms in Cosmo's ear, "that these _soldiers_
should be the only ones to get off--and in a vessel, too. What were the
seamen about?"

"What were _our_ seamen about?" returned Cosmo. "How many of _them_ got
off? I warned them that ships would not do. But it was a bright idea of
this De Beauxchamps and his friends to build a submersible. It didn't
occur to me, or I would have advised their construction everywhere for
small parties. But it would never have done for us. A submersible would
not have been capacious enough for the party I wanted to take."

By this time the visitors were aboard, and Cosmo and the others who
could get near enough to grasp them by the hand greeted them effusively.
King Richard received De Beauxchamps with emotion, and thanked him again
and again for having saved his life; but, in the end, he covered his
face and said in a broken voice:

"M. De Beauxchamps, my gratitude to you is very deep--but, oh, the
queen--the queen--and the children! I should have done better to perish
with them."

Cosmo and De Beauxchamps soothed him as well as they could, and the
former led the way into the grand saloon, in order that as many as
possible might see and greet their visitors, who had come so
mysteriously up out of the sea.

All of the Frenchmen were as affable as their leader, and he presented
them in turn. De Beauxchamps conversed almost gaily with such of the
ladies as had sufficient command of their feelings to join the throng
that pressed about him and his companions. He was deeply touched by the
story of the recent rescue of his countrymen from the Pyrenees, and he
went among them, trying to cheer them up, with the _élan_ that no
misfortune can eradicate from the Gallic nature.

At length Cosmo reminded him that he had said that he had some
interesting news to communicate.

"Yes," said De Beauxchamps, "I have just come from a visit to Paris."

Exclamations of amazement and incredulity were heard on all sides.

"It is true," resumed the Frenchman, though now his voice lost all its
gayety. "I had conceived the project of such a visit before I met the
Ark and transferred His Majesty, the King of England, to your care. As
soon as that was done I set out to make the attempt."

"But tell me first," interrupted Cosmo, "how you succeeded in finding
the Ark again."

"That was not very difficult," replied De Beauxchamps, smiling. "Of
course, it was to some extent accidental, for I didn't _know_ that you
would be here, navigating over France; but I had an idea that you
_might_ come this way if you had an intention of seeing what had
happened to Europe. It is my regular custom to rise frequently to the
surface to take a look around and make sure of my bearings, and you know
that the Ark makes a pretty large point on the waters. I saw it long
before you caught sight of me."

"Very well," said Cosmo. "Please go on with your story. It must, indeed,
be an extraordinary one."

"I was particularly desirous of seeing Paris again, deep as I knew her
to lie under the waves," resumed De Beauxchamps, "because it was my
home, and I had a house in the Champs Elysées. You cannot divorce the
heart of a Frenchman from his home, though you should bury it under
twenty oceans."

"Your family were lost?"

"Thank God, I had no family. If I had had they would be with me. My
companions are all like myself in that respect. We have lost many
friends, but no near relatives. As I was saying, I started for France,
poor drowned France, as soon as I left you. With the powerful
searchlight of the _Jules Verne_ I could feel confident of avoiding
obstructions; and, besides, I knew very closely the height to which the
flood had risen, and having the topography of my country at my fingers'
ends, as does every officer of the army, I was able to calculate the
depth at which we should run in order to avoid the hilltops."

"But surely," said Cosmo, "it is impossible--at least, it seems so to
me--that you can descend to any great depth--the pressure must be
tremendous a few hundred feet down, to say nothing of possible
thousands."

"All that," replied the Frenchman, "has been provided for. You probably
do not know to what extent we had carried experiments in France on the
deep submersion of submarines before their general abandonment when they
were prohibited by international agreement in war. I was myself perhaps
the leader in those investigations, and in the construction of the
_Jules Verne_ I took pains to improve on all that had hitherto been
done.

"Without going into any description of my devices, I may simply remind
you nature has pointed out ways of avoiding the consequences of the
inconceivable pressures which calculation indicates at depths of a
kilometer, or more, in her construction of the deep-sea fishes. It was
by a study of them that I arrived at the secret of both penetrating to
depths that would theoretically have seemed entirely impossible and of
remaining at such depths."

"Marvelous!" exclaimed Cosmo; "marvelous beyond belief!"

"I may add," continued De Beauxchamps, smiling at the effect that his
words had had upon the mind of the renowned Cosmo Versál, "that the
peculiar properties of levium, which you so wisely chose for your Ark,
aided _me_ in quite a different way. But I must return to my story.

"We passed over the coast of France near the point where I knew lay the
mouth of the Loire. I could have found my way by means of the compass
sufficiently well; but since the sky was clear I frequently came to the
surface in order, for greater certainty, to obtain sights of the sun and
stars.

"I dropped down at Tours and at Blois, and we plainly saw the walls of
the old châteaux in the gleam of the searchlight below us. There were
monsters of the deep, such as the eye of man never beheld, swimming
slowly about them, many of them throwing a strange luminosity into the
water from their phosphorescent organs, as if they were inspecting these
novelties of the sea-bottom.

"Arrived over Orleans, we turned in the direction of Paris. As we
approached the site of the city I sank the submersible until we almost
touched the higher hills. My searchlight is so arranged that it can be
directed almost every way--up, down, to this side, and to that--and we
swept it round us in every direction.

"The light readily penetrated the water and revealed sights which I have
no power to describe, and some--reminders of the immense population of
human beings which had there met its end--which I would not describe if
I could. To see a drowned face suddenly appear outside the window,
almost within touch--ah, that was too horrible!

"We passed over Versailles, with the old palace still almost intact;
over Sčvres, with its porcelain manufactory yet in part standing--the
tidal waves that had come up the river from the sea evidently caused
much destruction just before the downpour began--and finally we
'entered' Paris.

"We could see the embankments of the Seine beneath us as we passed up
its course from the Point du Jour. From the site of the Champ de Mars I
turned northward in search of the older part of the Champs Élysées,
where my house was, and we came upon the great Arc de Triomphe, which,
you remember, dates from the time of Napoleon.

"It was apparently uninjured, even the huge bronze groups remaining in
their places, and the searchlight, traversing its face, fell upon the
heroic group on the east façade of the Marseillaise. You must have seen
that, M. Versál?"

"Yes, many a time," Cosmo replied. "The fury in the face of the female
figure representing the spirit of war, chanting the 'Marseillaise,' and,
sword in hand, sweeping over the heads of the soldiers, is the most
terrible thing of human making that I ever looked upon."

"It was not so terrible as another thing that our startled eyes beheld
there," said De Beauxchamps. "Coiled round the upper part of the arch,
with its head resting directly upon that of the figure of which you
speak, was a monstrous, ribbon-shaped creature, whose flat, reddish
body, at least a meter in width and apparently thirty meters long, and
bordered with a sort of floating frill of a pinkish color, undulated
with a motion that turned us sick at heart.

"But the head was the most awful object that the fancy of a madman could
conceive. There were two great round, projecting eyes, encircled with
what I suppose must have been phosphorescent organs, which spread around
in the water a green light that was absolutely horrifying.

"I turned away the searchlight, and the eyes of that creature stared
straight at us with a dreadful, stony look; and then the effect of the
phosphorescence, heightened by the absence of the greater light, became
more terrible than before. We were unmanned, and I hardly had nerve
enough to turn the submersible away and hurry from the neighborhood."

"I had not supposed," said Cosmo, "that creatures of such a size could
live in the deeper parts of the sea."

"I know," returned De Beauxchamps, "that many have thought that the
abysmal creatures were generally of small size, but they knew nothing
about it. What could one have expected to learn of the secrets of life
in the ocean depths from the small creatures which alone the trawls
brought to the surface? The great monsters could not be captured in that
way. But we have _seen_ them--seen them taking possession of beautiful,
drowned Paris--and we know what they are."

The fascinated hearers who had crowded about to listen to the narrative
of De Beauxchamps shuddered at this part of it, and some of the women
turned away with exclamations of horror.

"I see that I am drawing my picture in too fearful colors," he said,
"and I shall refrain from telling of the other inhabitants of the abyss
that we found in possession of what I, as a Frenchman, must call the
most splendid capital that the world contained.

"Oh, to think that all that beauty, all those great palaces filled with
the master-works of art, all those proud architectural piles, all that
scene of the most joyous life that the earth contained, is now become
the dwelling-place of the terrible _fauna_ of the deep, creatures that
never saw the sun; that never felt the transforming force of the
evolution which had made the face of the globe so glorious; that never
quitted their abysmal homes until this awful flood spread their empire
over the whole earth!"

There was a period of profound silence while De Beauxchamps's face
worked spasmodically under the influence of emotions, the sight of which
would alone have sufficed to convince his hearers of the truth of what
he had been telling. Finally Cosmo Versál, breaking the silence, asked:

"Did you find your home?"

"Yes. It was there. I found it out. I illuminated it with the
searchlight. I gazed into the broken windows, trying to peer through the
watery medium that filled and darkened the interior. The roof was
broken, but the walls were intact. I thought of the happy, happy years
that I had passed there when I _had_ a family, and when Paris was an
Eden, the sunshine of the world. And then I wished to see no more, and
we rose out of the midst of that sunken city and sought the daylight far
above.

"I had thought to tell you," he continued, after a pause, "of the
condition in which we found the great monuments of the city--of the
Pantheon, yet standing on its hill with its roof crushed in; of Nôtre
Dame--a wreck, but the towers still standing proudly; of the old palace
of the Louvre, through whose broken roofs and walls we caught glimpses
of the treasures washed by the water within--but I find that I have not
courage to go on. I had imagined that it would be a relief to speak of
these things, but I do not find it so."

"After leaving Paris, then you made no other explorations?" said Cosmo.

"None. I should have had no heart for more. I had seen enough. And yet I
do not regret that I went there. I should never have been content not to
have seen my beautiful city once more, even lying in her watery shroud.
I loved her living; I have seen her dead. It is finished. What more is
there, M. Versál?" With a sudden change of manner: "You have predicted
all this, and perhaps you know more. Where do _we_ go to die?"

"We shall _not_ die," replied Cosmo Versál forcefully. "The Ark and your
_Jules Verne_ will save us."

"To what purpose?" demanded the Frenchman, his animation all gone. "Can
there be any pleasure in floating upon or beneath the waves that cover a
lost world? Is a brief prolongation of such a life worth the effort of
grasping for?"

"Yes," said Cosmo with still greater energy. "We may still _save the
race_. I have chosen most of my companions in the Ark for that purpose.
Not only may we save the race of man, but we may lead it up upon a
higher plane; we may apply the principles of eugenics as they have never
yet been applied. You, M. De Beauxchamps, have shown that you are of the
stock that is required for the regeneration of the world."

"But where can the world be regenerated?" asked De Beauxchamps with a
bitter laugh. "There is nothing left but mountain-tops."

"Even they will be covered," said Cosmo.

"Do you mean that the deluge has not yet reached its height?"

"Certainly it has not. We are in an open space in the enveloping nebula.
After a little we shall enter the nucleus, and then will come the
worst."

"And yet you talk of saving the race!" exclaimed the Frenchman with
another bitter laugh.

"I do," replied Cosmo, "and it will be done."

"But how?"

"Through the re-emergence of land."

"That recalls our former conversation," put in Professor Abel Able. "It
appears to me impossible that, when the earth is once covered with a
universal ocean, it can ever disappear or materially lower its level.
Geological ages would be required for the level of the water to be
lowered even a few feet by the escape of vapor into space."

"No," returned Cosmo Versál, "I have demonstrated that that idea is
wrong. Under the immense pressure of an ocean rising six miles above the
ancient sea level the water will rapidly be forced into the interstices
of the crust, and thus a material reduction of level will be produced
within a few years--five at the most. That will give us a foothold. I
have no doubt that even now the water around us is slightly lowering
through that cause.

"But in itself that will not be sufficient. I have gone all over this
ground in my original calculations. The intrusion of the immense mass of
ocean water into the interior of the crust of the earth will result in a
grand geological upheaval. The lands will re-emerge above the new sea
level as they emerged above the former one through the internal stresses
of the globe."

The scientific men present listened with breathless interest, but some
of them with many incredulous shakings of the head.

"You must be aware," continued Cosmo, addressing them particularly,
"that it has been demonstrated that the continents and the great
mountain ranges are buoyed up, and, as it were, are floating somewhat
like slags on the internal magma. The mean density of the crust is less
under the land and the mountains than under the old sea-beds. This is
especially true of the Himalayan region.

"That uplift is probably the most recent of all, and it is there, where
at present the highest land of the globe exists, that I expect that the
new upheaval will be most strongly manifested. It is for that reason,
and not merely because it is now the highest part of the earth, that I
am going with the Ark to Asia."

"But," said Professor Jeremiah Moses, "the upheaval of which you speak
may produce a complete revolution in the surface of the earth, and if
new lands are upthrust they may appear at unexpected points."

"Not at all," returned Cosmo. "The tectonic features of the globe were
fixed at the beginning. As Asia has hitherto been the highest and the
greatest mass of land, it will continue to be so in the future. It is
there, believe me, that we shall replant the seed of humanity."

"Do you not think," asked Professor Alexander Jones, "that there will be
a tremendous outburst of volcanic energy, if such upheavals occur, and
may not that render the re-emerging lands uninhabitable?"

"No doubt," Cosmo replied, "every form of plutonic energy will be
immensely re-enforced. You remember the recent outburst of all the
volcanoes when the sea burst over the borders of the continents. But
these forces will be mainly expended in an effort of uplifting.
Unquestionably there will be great volcanic spasms, but they will not
prevent the occupation of the broadening areas of land which will not be
thus affected."

"Upon these lands," exclaimed Sir Wilfrid Athelstone, in a loud voice,
"I will develop life from the barren minerals of the crust. The age of
chemical parthenogenesis will then have dawned upon the earth, and man
will have become a creator."

"Will the Sir Englishman give me room for a word!" cried Costaké
Theriade, raising his tall form on his toes and agitating his arms in
the air. "He will create not anything! It is _I_ that will unloose the
energies of the atoms of matter and make of the new man a new god."

Cosmo Versál quieted the incipient outbreak of his jealous "speculative
geniuses," and the discussion of his theory was continued for some time.
At length De Beauxchamps, shrugging his shoulders, exclaimed, with a
return of his habitual gayety:

"_Trčs bien! Vive_ the world of Cosmo Versál! I salute the new Eve that
is to come!"




CHAPTER XX

THE ADVENTURES IN COLORADO


When Professor Pludder, the President, and their companions on the
aero-raft, saw the three men on the bluff motioning and shouting to
them, they immediately sought the means of bringing their craft to land.
This did not prove to be exceedingly difficult, for there was a
convenient rock with deep water around it on which they could disembark.

The men ran down to meet them, and to help them ashore, exhibiting the
utmost astonishment at seeing them there.

"Whar in creation did _you_ come from?" exclaimed one, giving the
professor a pull up the bank. "Mebbe you're Cosmo Versál, and that's yer
Ark."

"I'm Professor Pludder, and this is the President of the United States."

"The President of the Un----See here, stranger, I'll take considerable
from you, considering the fix yer in, but you don't want to go too far."

"It's true," asseverated the professor. "This gentleman is the
President, and we've escaped from Washington. Please help the ladies."

"I'll help the ladies all right, but I'm blamed if I believe yer yarn.
How'd you git here? You couldn't hev floated across the continent on
that thing."

"We came on the raft that you see," interrupted Mr. Samson. "We left the
Appalachian Mountains two weeks ago."

"Well, by--it must be true!" muttered the man. "They couldn't hev come
from anywhar else in that direction. I reckon the hull blamed continent
is under water."

"So it is," said Professor Pludder, "and we made for Colorado, knowing
that it was the only land left above the flood."

All finally got upon the bluff, rejoiced to feel solid ground once more
beneath their feet. But it was a desolate prospect that they saw before
them. The face of the land had been scoured and gullied by the pouring
waters, the vegetation had been stripped off, except where in hollows it
had been covered with new-formed lakes, some of which had drained off
after the downpour ceased, the water finding its way into the enveloping
sea.

They asked the three men what had become of the other inhabitants, and
whether there was any shelter at hand.

"We've be'n wiped out," said the original spokesman. "Cosmo Versál has
done a pretty clean job with his flood. There's a kind of a cover that
we three hev built, a ways back yonder, out o' timber o' one kind and
another that was lodged about. But it wouldn't amount to much if there
was another cloudburst. It wouldn't stand a minute. It's good to sleep
in."

"Are you the only survivors in this region?" asked the President.

"I reckon you see all thet's left of us. The' ain't one out o' a hundred
that's left alive in these parts."

"What became of them?"

"Swept off!" replied the man, with an expressive gesture--"and drownded
right out under the sky."

"And how did you and your companions escape?"

"By gitting up amongst some rocks that was higher'n the average."

"How did you manage to live--what did you have to eat?"

"We didn't eat much--we didn't hev much time to think o' eatin'. We had
one hoss with us, and he served, when his time come. After the sky
cleared we skirmished about and dug up something that we could manage to
eat, lodged in gullies where the water had washed together what had been
in houses and cellars. We've got a gun and a little ammunition, and once
in a while we could kill an animal that had contrived to escape
somehow."

"And you think that there are no other human beings left alive anywhere
around here?"

"I _know_ th' ain't. The's probably some up in the foothills, and around
the Pike. They had a better chance to git among rocks. We hed jest made
up our minds to go hunting for 'em when we ketched sight o' you, and
then we concluded to stay and see who you was."

"I'm surprised that you didn't go sooner."

"We couldn't. There was a roarin' torrent coming down from the mountains
that cut us off. It's only last night that it stopped."

"Well, it's evident that we cannot stay here," said Professor Pludder.
"We must go with these men toward the mountains. Let us take what's left
of the compressed provisions out of the raft, and then we'll eat a good
meal and be off."

The three men were invited to share the repast, and they ate with an
appetite that would have amused their hosts if they had not been so
anxious to reserve as much as possible of their provisions for future
necessities.

The meal finished, they started off, their new friends aiding to carry
provisions, and what little extra clothing there was. The aspect of the
country they traversed affrighted them. Here and there were partially
demolished houses or farm structures, or cellars, choked with débris of
what had once been houses.

Farm implements and machinery were scattered about and half buried in
the torrent-furrowed land. In the wreck of one considerable village
through which they passed they found a stone church, and several stone
houses of considerable pretensions, standing almost intact as to walls,
but with roofs, doors, and windows smashed and torn off.

It was evident that this place, which lay in a depression of the land,
had been buried by the rushing water as high as high as the top stories
of the buildings. From some of the sights that they saw they shrank
away, and afterward tried to forget them.

Owing to the presence of the women and children their progress was
slower than it might overwise have been. They had great difficulty in
crossing the course of the torrent which their companions had described
as cutting them off from the foothills of the Pike's Peak range.

The water had washed out a veritable cańon, a hundred or more feet deep
in places, and with ragged, precipitous walls and banks, which they had
to descend on one side and ascend on the other. Here the skill and local
knowledge of their three new-found friends stood them in good stead.
There was yet enough water in the bottom of the great gully to compel
them to wade, carrying the women and children.

But, just before nightfall, they succeeded in reaching a range of rocky
heights, where they determined to pass the night. They managed to make a
fire with brush that had been swept down the mountain flanks and had
remained wedged in the rocks, and thus they dried their soaked garments,
and were able to do some cooking, and to have a blaze to give them a
little heat during the night, for the air turned cold after the
disappearance of the sun.

When the others had sunk into an uneasy slumber, the President and
Professor Pludder sat long, replenishing the fire, and talking of what
would be their future course.

"I think," said the professor, "that we shall find a considerable
population alive among the mountains. There is nothing in Colorado below
four thousand feet elevation, and not much below five thousand. The
great inner 'parks' were probably turned into lakes, but they will drain
off, as the land around us here has done already.

"Those who managed to find places of comparative shelter will now
descend into the level lands and try to hunt up the sites of their
homes. If only some plants and grain have been preserved they can, after
a fashion, begin to cultivate the soil."

"But there _is_ no soil," said the President, shuddering at the
recollection of the devastation he had witnessed. "It has all been
washed off."

"No," replied the professor, "there's yet a good deal in the low places,
where the water rested."

"But it is now the middle of winter."

"Reckoned by the almanac it is, but you see that the temperature is that
of summer, and has been such for months. I think that this is due in
some way to the influence of the nebula, although I cannot account for
it. At any rate it will be possible to plant and sow.

"The whole body of the atmosphere having been raised four thousand feet,
the atmospheric conditions here now are virtually the same as at the
former sea-level. If we can find the people and reassure them, we must
take the lead in restoring the land to fertility, and also in the
reconstruction of homes."

"Suppose the flood should recommence?"

"There is no likelihood of it."

"Then," said the President, putting his face between his hands and
gazing sadly into the fire, "here is all that remains of the mightiest
nation of the world, the richest, the most populous--and we are to build
up out of this remnant a new fatherland."

"This is not the only remnant," said Professor Pludder. "One-quarter, at
least, of the area of the United States is still above sea-level. Think
of Arizona, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, the larger part of California,
Wyoming, a part of Montana, two-thirds of Idaho, a half of Oregon and
Washington--all above the critical level of four thousand feet, and all
except the steepest moutainsides can be reclaimed.

"There is hope for our country yet. Remember that the climate of this
entire region will now be changed, since the barometric isobars have
been lifted up, and the line of thirty inches pressure now meets the
edge of the Colorado plateau. There may be a corresponding change in the
rainfall and in all the conditions of culture and fertility."

"Yes," sighed the President, "but I cannot, I cannot withdraw my mind
from the thought of the _millions, millions, millions_ who have
perished!"

"I do not say that we should forget them," replied Professor Pludder;
"Heaven forbid! But I do say that we must give our attention to those
that remain, and turn our faces steadily toward the future."

"Abiel," returned the President, pressing the professor's hand, "you are
right. My confidence in you was shaken, but now I follow you again."

Thus they talked until midnight, and then got a little rest with the
others. They were up and off at break of day, and as they mounted higher
they began to encounter immense rocks that had come tumbling down from
above.

"How can you talk of people escaping toward the mountains if they had to
encounter these?" demanded the President.

"Some of these rocks have undoubtedly been brought down by the
torrents," Professor Pludder replied, "but I believe that the greater
number fell earlier, during the earthquakes that accompanied the first
invasions of the sea."

"But those earthquakes may have continued all through."

"I do not think so. We have felt no trembling of the earth. I believe
that the convulsions lasted only for a brief period, while the rocks
were yielding to the pressure along the old sea-coast. After a little
the crust below adjusted itself to the new conditions. And even if the
rocks fell while people were trying to escape from the flood below, they
must, like the water, have followed the gorges and hollow places, while
the fugitives would, of course, keep upon the ridges."

Whatever perils they may have encountered, people had certainly escaped
as the professor had averred. When the party, in the middle of the day,
were seated at their lunch, on an elevated point from which they could
see far over the strange ocean that they had left behind them, while the
southern buttresses of Pike's Peak rose steeply toward the north, they
discovered the first evidence of the existence of refugees in the
mountains. This was a smoke rising over an intervening ridge, which
their new companions declared could be due to nothing less than a large
camp-fire.

They hastened to finish their meal, and then climbed the ridge. As soon
as they were upon it they found themselves looking down into a broad,
shallow cańon, where there were nearly twenty rudely constructed cabins,
with a huge fire blazing in the midst of the place, and half a dozen
red-shirted men busy about it, evidently occupied in the preparation of
the dinner of a large party.

Their friends recognized an acquaintance in one of the men below and
hailed him with delight. Instantly men, women, and children came running
out of the huts to look at them, and as they descended into this
improvised village they were received with a hospitality that was almost
hilarious.

The refugees consisted of persons who had escaped from the lower lands
in the immediate vicinity, and they were struck dumb when told that they
were entertaining the President of the United States and his family.

The entire history of their adventures was related on both sides. The
refugees told how, at the commencement of the great rain, when it became
evident that the water would inundate their farms and buildings, they
loaded themselves with as many provisions as they could carry, and, in
spite of the suffocating downpour that filled the air, managed to fight
their way to the ridge overhanging the deep cut in which they were now
encamped.

Hardly a quarter of those who started arrived in safety. They sheltered
themselves to the number of about thirty, in a huge cavern, which faced
down the mountain, and had a slightly upward sloping floor, so that the
water did not enter. Here, by careful economy, they were able to eke out
their provisions until the sky cleared, after which the men, being used
to outdoor labor and hunting, contrived to supply the wants of the
forlorn little community.

They managed to kill a few animals, and found the bodies of others
recently killed, or drowned. Later they descended into the lowlands, as
the water ran off, and searching among the ruins of their houses found
some remnants of supplies in the cellars and about the foundations of
the barns. They were preparing to go down in a body and seek to
re-establish themselves on the sites of their old homes, when the
President's party came upon them.

The meeting with these refugees was but the first of a series of similar
encounters on the way along the eastern face of the Pike's Peak range.
In the aggregate they met several hundred survivors who had established
themselves on the site of Colorado Springs, where a large number of
houses, standing on the higher ground, had escaped.

They had been soaked with water, descending through the shattered roofs
and broken windows, and pouring into the basements and cellars. The
fugitives came from all directions, some from the caverns on the
mountains, and some from the rocks toward the north and east. A
considerable number asserted that they had found refuge in the Garden of
the Gods.

As near as could be estimated, about a quarter of the population
remained alive.

The strong points of Professor Pludder now, once more, came out
conspicuously. He proved himself an admirable organizer. He explored all
the country round, and enheartened everybody, setting them to work to
repair the damage as much as possible.

Some horses and cattle were found which, following their instincts, had
managed to escape the flood. In the houses and other buildings yet
standing a great deal of food and other supplies were discovered, so
that there was no danger of a famine. As he had anticipated, the soil
had not all been washed away from the flat land, and he advised the
inhabitants to plant quick-growing seeds at once.

He utilized the horses to send couriers in all directions, some going
even as far as Denver. Everywhere virtually the same conditions were
found--many had escaped and were alive, only needing the guidance of a
quicker intelligence, and this was supplied by the advice which the
professor instructed his envoys to spread among the people. He sought to
cheer them still more by the information that the President was among
them, and looking out for their welfare.

One thing which his couriers at last began to report to him was a cause
of surprise. They said that the level of the water was rapidly falling.
Some who had gone far toward the east declared that it had gone down
hundreds of feet. But the professor reflected that this was impossible,
because evaporation could not account for it, and he could not persuade
himself that so much water could have found its way into the interior of
the crust.

He concluded that his informants had allowed their hopes to affect their
eyesight, and, strong as usual in his professional dogmas, he made no
personal examination. Besides, Professor Pludder was beginning to be
shaken in his first belief that all trouble from the nebula was at an
end. Once having been forced to accept the hypothesis that a watery
nebula had met the earth, he began to reflect that they might not be
through with it.

In any event, he deemed it wise to prepare for it if it _should_ come
back. Accordingly he advised that the population that remained should
concentrate in the stronger houses, built of stone, and that every
effort should be made to strengthen them further and to make the roofs
as solid as possible. He also directed that no houses should be occupied
that were not situated on high ground, surrounded with slopes that would
give ready flow to the water in case the deluging rain should
recommence.

He had no fixed conviction that it would recommence, but he was uneasy,
owing to his reflections, and wished to be on the safe side. He sent
similar instructions as far as his horsemen could reach.

The wisdom of his doubts became manifest about two weeks after the
arrival of the President's party. Without warning the sky, which had
been perfectly blue and cloudless for a month, turned a sickly yellow.
Then mists hid the head, and in a little while the entire outline of
Pike's Peak, and after that a heavy rain began.

Terror instantly seized the people, and at first nobody ventured out of
doors. But as time went on and the rain did not assume the proportions
of the former _débâcle_, although it was very heavy and continuous, hope
revived. Everybody was on the watch for a sudden clearing up.

Instead of clearing, however, the rain became very irregular, gushing at
times in torrents which were even worse than the original downpour, but
these tremendous gushes were of brief duration, so that the water had an
opportunity to run off the higher ground before the next downpour
occurred.

This went on for a week, and then the people were terrified at finding
that water was pouring up through all the depressions of the land,
cutting off the highlands from Pike's Peak with an arm of the sea. It
was evident that the flood had been rapidly rising, and if it should
rise but little higher they would be caught in a trap. The inland sea,
it was clear, had now invaded the whole of Colorado to the feet of the
mountains, and was creeping up on them.

Just at this time a series of earthquakes began. They were not severe,
but were continuous. The ground cracked open in places, and some houses
were overturned, but there were no wall-shattering shocks--only a
continual and dreadful trembling, accompanied by awful subterranean
sounds.

This terrible state of affairs had lasted for a day before a remarkable
discovery was made, which filled many hearts with joy, although it
seemed to puzzle Professor Pludder as much as it rejoiced him.

The new advance of the sea was arrested! There could be no question of
that, for too many had anxiously noted the points to which the water had
attained.

We have said that Professor Pludder was puzzled. He was seeking, in his
mind, a connection between the seismic tremors and the cessation of the
advance of the sea. Inasmuch as the downpour continued, the flood ought
still to rise.

He rejected as soon as it occurred to him the idea that the earth could
be drinking up the waters as fast as they fell, and that the trembling
was an accompaniment of this gigantic deglutition.

Sitting in a room with the President and other members of the party from
Washington, he remained buried in his thoughts, answering inquiries only
in monosyllables. Presently he opened his eyes very wide and a
long-drawn "A-ah!" came from his mouth. Then he sprang to his feet and
cried out, but only as if uttering a thought aloud to himself, the
strange word:

_"Batholite!"_




CHAPTER XXI

"THE FATHER OF HORROR"


At the time when the President of the United States and his companions
were beginning to discover the refugees around Pike's Peak, Cosmo
Versál's Ark accompanied by the _Jules Verne_, whose commander had
decided to remain in touch with his friends, was crossing the submerged
hills and valleys of Languedoc under a sun as brilliant as that which
had once made them a land of gold.

De Beauxchamps remained aboard the Ark much of the time. Cosmo liked to
have him, with himself and Captain Arms, on the bridge, because there
they could talk freely about their plans and prospects, and the
Frenchman was a most entertaining companion.

Meanwhile, the passengers in the saloons and on the promenade decks
formed little knots and coteries for conversation, for reading, and for
mutual diversion, or strolled about from side to side, watching the
endless expanse of waters for the occasional appearance of some
inhabitant of the deep that had wandered over the new ocean's bottom.

These animals seemed to be coming to the surface to get bearings. Every
such incident reminded the spectators of what lay beneath the waves, and
led them to think and talk of the awful fate that had overwhelmed their
fellow men, until the spirits of the most careless were subdued by the
pervading melancholy.

King Richard, strangely enough, had taken a liking for Amos Blank, who
was frequently asked to join the small and somewhat exclusive circle of
compatriots that continually surrounded the fallen monarch. The
billionaire and the king often leaned elbow to elbow over the rail, and
put their heads companionably together while pointing out some object on
the sea. Lord Swansdown felt painfully cut by this, but, of course, he
could offer no objection.

Finally Cosmo invited the king to come upon the bridge, from which
passengers were generally excluded, and the king insisted that Blank
should go, too. Cosmo consented, for Blank seemed to him to have become
quite a changed man, and he found him sometimes full of practical
suggestions.

So it happened that when Captain Arms announced that the Ark was passing
over the ancient city of Carcassonne, Cosmo, the king, De Beauxchamps,
Amos Blank, and the captain were all together on the bridge. When
Captain Arms mentioned their location, King Richard became very
thoughtful. After a time he said musingly:

"Ah! how all these names, Toulouse, Carcassonne, Languedoc, bring back
to me the memory of my namesake of olden times, Richard I. of England.
This, over which we are floating, was the land of the Troubadours, and
Richard was the very Prince of Troubadours. With all his faults England
never had a king like him!"

"Knowing your devotion to peace, which was the reason why I wished you
to be of the original company in the Ark, I am surprised to hear you say
that," said Cosmo.

"Ah!" returned the King, "But Coeur de Lion was a true Englishman, even
in his love of fighting. What would he say if he knew where England lies
to-day? What would he say if he knew the awful fate that has come upon
this fair and pleasant land, from whose poets and singers he learned the
art of minstrelsy?"

"He would say, 'Do not despair,'" replied Cosmo. "' Show the courage of
an Englishman, and fight for your race if you cannot for your country.'"

"But may not England, may not all these lands, emerge again from the
floods?" asked the king.

"Not in our time, not in our children's time," said Cosmo Versál,
thoughtfully shaking his head.

"In the remote future, yes--but I cannot tell how remote. Tibet was once
an appanage of your crown, before China taught the West what war meant,
and in Tibet you may help to found a new empire, but I must tell you
that it will not resemble the empires of the past. Democracy will be its
corner stone, and science its law."

"Then I devote myself to democracy and science," responded King Richard.

"Good! Admirable!" exclaimed Amos Blank and De Beauxchamps
simultaneously, while Captain Arms would probably have patted the king
on the back had not his attention, together with that of the others,
been distracted by a huge whale blowing almost directly in the course of
the Ark.

"Blessed if I ever expected to see a sight like that in these parts!"
exclaimed the captain. "This lifting the ocean up into the sky is
upsetting the order of nature. I'd as soon expect to sight a cachalot on
top of the Rocky Mountains."

"They'll be there, too, before long," said Cosmo.

"I wonder what he's looking for," continued Captain Arms. "He must have
come down from the north. He couldn't have got in through the Pyrenees
or the Sierra Nevadas. He's just navigated right over the whole country
straight down from the English Channel."

The whale sounded at the approach of the Ark, but in a little while he
was blowing again off toward the south, and then the passengers caught
sight of him, and there was great excitement.

He seemed to be of enormous size, and he sent his fountain to an
extraordinary height in the air. On he went, appearing and disappearing,
steering direct for Africa, until, with glasses, they could see his
white plume blowing on the very edge of the horizon.

Not even the reflection that they themselves were sailing over Europe
impressed some of the passengers with so vivid a sense of their
situation as the sight of this monstrous inhabitant of the ocean taking
a view of his new domain.

At night Cosmo continued the concerts and the presentation of the
Shakespearian dramas, and for an hour each afternoon he had a
"conference" in the saloon, at which Theriade and Sir Athelstone were
almost the sole performers.

Their disputes, and Cosmo's efforts to keep the peace, amused for a
while, but at length the audiences diminished until Cosmo, with his
constant companions, the Frenchman, the king, Amos Blank, the three
professors from Washington, and a few other savants were the only
listeners.

But the music and the plays always drew immensely.

Joseph Smith was kept busy most of the time in Cosmo's cabin, copying
plans for the regeneration of mankind.

When they knew that they had finally left the borders of France and were
sailing above the Mediterranean Sea, it became necessary to lay their
course with considerable care. Cosmo decided that the only safe plan
would be to run south of Sardinia, and then keep along between Sicily
and Tunis, and so on toward lower Egypt.

There he intended to seek a way over the mountains north of the Sinai
peninsula into the Syrian desert, from which he could reach the ancient
valley of the Euphrates and the Persian Gulf. He would then pass down
the Arabian Sea, swing round India and Ceylon, and, by way of the Bay of
Bengal and the plains of the Ganges and Brahmaputra, approach the
Himalayas.

Captain Arms was rather inclined to follow the Gulf of Suez and the
depression of the Red Sea, but Cosmo was afraid that they would have
difficulty in getting the Ark safely through between the Mt. Sinai peaks
and the Jebel Gharib range.

"Well, you're the commodore," said the captain at the end of the
discussion, "but hang me if I'd not rather follow a sea, where I know
the courses, than go navigating over mountains and deserts in the land
of Shinar. We'll land on top of Jerusalem yet, you'll see!"

Feeling sure of plenty of water under keel, they now made better speed
and De Beauxchamps retired into the _Jules Verne_, and detached it from
the Ark, finding that he could distance the latter easily with the
submersible running just beneath the surface of the water.

"Come up to blow, and take a look around from the bridge, once in a
while," the captain called out to him as he disappeared and the cover
closed over him. The _Jules Verne_ immediately sank out of sight.

They passed round Sardinia, and between the old African coast and
Sicily, and were approaching the Malta Channel when their attention was
drawn to a vast smoke far off toward the north.

"It's Etna in eruption," said Cosmo to the captain.

"A magnificent sight!" exclaimed King Richard, who happened to be on the
bridge.

"Yes, and I'd like to see it nearer," remarked Cosmo, as a wonderful
column of smoke, as black as ink, seemed to shoot up to the very zenith.

"You'd better keep away," Captain Arms said warningly. "There's no good
comes of fooling round volcanoes in a ship."

"Oh, it's safe enough," returned Cosmo. "We can run right over the
southeastern corner of Sicily and get as near as we like. There is
nothing higher than about three thousand feet in that part of the
island, so we'll have a thousand feet to spare."

"But maybe the water has lowered."

"Not more than a foot or two," said Cosmo. "Go ahead."

The captain plainly didn't fancy the adventure, but he obeyed orders,
and the Ark's nose was turned northward, to the delight of many of the
passengers who had become greatly interested when they learned that the
tremendous smoke that they saw came from Mount Etna.

Some of them were nervous, but the more adventurous spirits heartily
applauded Cosmo Versál's design to give them a closer view of so
extraordinary a spectacle. Even from their present distance the sight
was one that might have filled them with terror if they had not already
been through adventures which had hardened their nerves. The smoke was
truly terrific in appearance.

It did not spread low over the sea, but rose in an almost vertical
column, widening out at a height of several miles, until it seemed to
canopy the whole sky toward the north.

It could be seen spinning in immense rolling masses, the outer parts of
which were turned by the sunshine to a dingy brown color, while the main
stem of the column, rising directly from the great crater, was of pitchy
blackness.

An awful roaring was audible, sending a shiver through the Ark. At the
bottom of the mass of smoke, through which gleams of fire were seen to
shoot as they drew nearer, appeared the huge conical form of the
mountain, whose dark bulk still rose nearly seven thousand feet above
the sea that covered the great, beautiful, and historic island beneath
it.

They had got within about twenty miles of the base of the mountain, when
a shout was heard by those on the bridge, and Cosmo and the captain,
looking for its source, saw the _Jules Verne_, risen to the surface a
little to starboard, and De Beauxchamps excitedly signaling to them.
They just made out the words, "Sheer off!" when the Ark, with a groaning
sound, took ground, and they were almost precipitated over the rail of
the bridge.

"Aground again, by ----!" exclaimed Captain Arms, instantly signaling
all astern. "I told you not to go fooling round a volcano."

"This beats me!" cried Cosmo Versál. "I wonder if the island has begun
to rise."

"More likely the sea has begun to fall," growled Captain Arms.

"Do you know where we are?" asked Cosmo.

"We can't be anywhere but on the top of Monte Lauro," replied the
captain.

"But that's only three thousand feet high."

"It's exactly three thousand two hundred and thirty feet," said the
captain. "I haven't navigated the old Mediterranean a hundred times for
nothing."

"But even then we should have near seven hundred and fifty feet to
spare, allowing for the draft of the Ark, and a slight subsidence of the
water."

"Well, you haven't allowed enough, that's plain," said the captain.

"But it's impossible that the flood can have subsided more than seven
hundred feet already."

"I don't care how impossible it is--here we are! We're stuck on a
mountain-top, and if we don't leave our bones on it I'm a porpoise."

By this time the _Jules Verne_ was alongside, and De Beauxchamps shouted
up:

"I was running twenty feet under water, keeping along with the Ark, when
my light suddenly revealed the mountain ahead. I hurried up and tried to
warn you, but it was too late."

"Can't you go down and see where we're fast?" asked Cosmo.

"Certainly; that's just what I was about to propose," replied the
Frenchman, and immediately the submersible disappeared.

After a long time, during which Cosmo succeeded in allaying the fears of
his passengers, the submersible reappeared, and De Beauxchamps made his
report. He said that the Ark was fast near the bow on a bed of shelly
limestone.

He thought that by using the utmost force of the _Jules Verne_, whose
engines were very powerful, in pushing the Ark, combined with the
backing of her own engines, she might be got off.

"Hurry up, then, and get to work," cried Captain Arms. "This flood is on
the ebb, and a few hours more will find us stuck here like a ray with
his saw in a whale's back."

De Beauxchamps's plan was immediately adopted. The _Jules Verne_
descended, and pushed with all her force, while the engines of the Ark
were reversed, and within fifteen minutes they were once more afloat.

Without waiting for a suggestion from Cosmo Versál, the Frenchman
carefully inspected with his searchlight the bottom of the Ark where she
had struck, and when he came to the surface he was able to report that
no serious damage had resulted.

"There's no hole," he said, "only a slight denting of one of the plates,
which will not amount to anything."

Cosmo, however, was not content until he had made a careful inspection
by opening some of the manholes in the inner skin of the vessel. He
found no cause for anxiety, and in an hour the Ark resumed its voyage
eastward, passing over the site of ancient Syracuse.

By this time a change of the wind had sent the smoke from Etna in their
direction, and now it lay thick upon the water, and rendered it, for a
while, impossible to see twenty fathoms from the bridge.

"It's old Etna's dying salute," said Cosmo. "He won't have his head
above water much longer."

"But the flood is going down," exclaimed Captain Arms.

"Yes, and that puzzles me. There must have been an enormous absorption
of water into the interior, far greater than I ever imagined possible.
But wait until the nucleus of the nebula strikes us! In the meantime,
this lowering of the water renders it necessary for us to make haste, or
we may not get over the mountains round Suez before the downpour
recommences."

As soon as they escaped from the smoke of Etna they ran full speed ahead
again, and, keeping well south of Crete, at length, one morning they
found themselves in the latitude and longitude of Alexandria.

The weather was still superb, and Cosmo was very desirous of getting a
line on the present height of the water. He thought that he could make a
fair estimate of this from the known elevation of the mountains about
Sinai. Accordingly they steered in that direction, and on the way passed
directly over the site of Cairo.

Then the thought of the pyramids came to them all, and De Beauxchamps,
who had come aboard the Ark, and who was always moved by sentimental
considerations, proposed that they should spend a few hours here, while
he descended to inspect the condition in which the flood had left those
mighty monuments.

Cosmo not only consented to this, but he even offered to be a member of
the party. The Frenchman was only too glad to have his company. Cosmo
Versál descended into the submersible after instructing Captain Arms to
hover in the neighborhood.

The passengers and crew of the Ark, with expressions of anxiety that
would have pleased their subject if he had heard them, watched the
_Jules Verne_ disappear into the depths beneath.

The submersible was gone so long that the anxiety of those aboard the
Ark deepened into alarm, and finally became almost panic. They had never
before known how much they depended upon Cosmo Versál.

He was their only reliance, their only hope. He alone had known how to
keep up their spirits, and when he had assured them, as he so often did,
that the flooding would surely recommence, they had hardly been
terrified because of their unexpressed confidence that, let come what
would, his great brain would find a way out for them.

Now he was gone, down into the depths of this awful sea, where their
imaginations pictured a thousand unheard-of perils, and perhaps they
would never see him again! Without him they knew themselves to be
helpless. Even Captain Arms almost lost his nerve.

The strong good sense of Amos Blank alone saved them from the utter
despair that began to seize upon them as hour after hour passed without
the reappearance of the _Jules Verne_.

His experience had taught him how to keep a level head in an emergency,
and how to control panics. With King Richard always at his side, he went
about among the passengers and fairly laughed them out of their fears.

Without discussing the matter at all, he convinced them, by the simple
force of his own apparent confidence, that they were worrying themselves
about nothing.

He was, in fact, as much alarmed as any of the others, but he never
showed it. He started a rumor, after six hours had elapsed, that Cosmo
himself had said that they would probably require ten or twelve hours
for their exploration.

Cosmo had said nothing of the kind, but Blank's prevarication had its
intended effect, and fortunately, before the lapse of another six hours,
there was news from under the sea.

And what was happening in the mysterious depths below the Ark? What had
so long detained the submersible?

The point where the descent was made had been so well chosen that the
_Jules Verne_ almost struck the apex of the Great Pyramid as it
approached the bottom. The water was somewhat muddy from the sands of
the desert, and the searchlight streamed through a yellowish medium,
recalling the "golden atmosphere" for which Egypt had been celebrated.
But, nevertheless, the light was so powerful that they could see
distinctly at a distance of several rods.

The pyramid appeared to have been but little injured, although the
tremendous tidal wave that had swept up the Nile during the invasion of
the sea before the downpour began had scooped out the sand down to the
bed-rock on all sides.

Finding nothing of particular interest in a circuit of the pyramid, they
turned in the direction of the Great Sphinx.

This, too, had been excavated to its base, and it now stood up to its
full height, and a terrible expression seemed to have come into its
enigmatic features.

Cosmo wished to get a close look at it, and they ran the submersible
into actual contact with the forepart of the gigantic statue, just under
the mighty chin.

While they paused there, gazing out of the front window of the vessel, a
bursting sound was heard, followed by a loud crash, and the _Jules
Verne_ was shaken from stem to stern. Every man of them threw himself
against the sides of the vessel, for the sound came from overhead, and
they had an instinctive notion that the roof was being crushed down upon
them.

A second resounding crash was heard, shaking them like an earthquake,
and the little vessel rolled partly over upon its side.

"We are lost!" cried De Beauxchamps. "The Sphinx is falling upon us! We
shall be buried alive here!"

A third crash came over their heads, and the submersible seemed to sink
beneath them as if seeking to avoid the fearful blows that were rained
upon its roof.

Still, the stout curved ceiling, strongly braced within, did not yield,
although they saw, with affright, that it was bulged inward, and some of
the braces were torn from their places. But no water came in.

Stunned by the suddenness of the accident, for a few moments they did
nothing but cling to such supports as were within their reach, expecting
that another blow would either force the vessel completely over or break
the roof in.

But complete silence now reigned, and the missiles from above ceased to
strike the submersible. The searchlight continued to beam out of the
fore end of the vessel, and following its broad ray with their eyes,
they uttered one cry of mingled amazement and fear, and then stared
without a word at such a spectacle as the wildest imagination could not
have pictured.

The front of the Sphinx had disappeared, and the light, penetrating
beyond the place where it had stood, streamed upon the face and breast
of an enormous black figure, seated on a kind of throne, and staring
into their faces with flaming eyes which at once fascinated and
terrified them.

To their startled imaginations the eyes seemed to roll in their sockets,
and flashes of fire to dart from them. Their expression was menacing and
terrifying beyond belief. At the same time the aspect of the face was so
majestic that they cowered before it.

The cheekbones were high, massive, and polished until they shone in the
light; the nose and chin were powerful in their contours; and the brow
wore an intimidating frown. It seemed to the awed onlookers as if they
had sacrilegiously burst into the sanctuary of an offended god.

But, after a minute or two of stupefaction, they thought again of the
desperateness of their situation, and turned from staring at the strange
idol to consider what they should do.

The fact that no water was finding its way into the submersible somewhat
reassured them, but the question now arose whether it could be withdrawn
from its position.

They had no doubt that the front of the Sphinx, saturated by the water
after the thousands of years that it had stood there, exposed to the
desiccating influences of the sun and the desert sands, had suddenly
disintegrated, and fallen upon them, pinning their vessel fast under the
fragments of the huge head.

De Beauxchamps tried the engines and found that they had no effect in
moving the _Jules Verne_. He tried again and again by reversing to
disengage the vessel, but it would not stir. Then they debated the only
other means of escape.

"Although I have levium life-suits," said the Frenchman, "and although
the top of the _Jules Verne_ can probably be opened, for the door seems
not to have been touched, yet the instant it is removed the water will
rush in, and it will be impossible to pump out the vessel."

"Are your life-suits so arranged that they will permit of moving the
limbs?" demanded Cosmo.

"Certainly they are."

"And can they be weighted so as to remain at the bottom?"

"They are arranged for that," responded De Beauxchamps.

"And can the weights be detached by the inmates without permitting the
entrance of water?"

"It can be done, although a very little water might enter during the
operation."

"Then," said Cosmo, "let us put on the suits, open the door, take out
the ballast so that, if released, the submersible will rise to the
surface through its own buoyancy, and then see if we cannot loosen the
vessel from outside."

It was a suggestion whose boldness made even the owner and constructor
of the _Jules Verne_ stare for a moment, but evidently it was the only
possible way in which the vessel might be saved; and knowing that, in
case of failure, they could themselves float to the surface after
removing the weights from the bottom of the suits, they unanimously
decided to try Cosmo Versál's plan.

It was terribly hard work getting the ballast out of the submersible,
working as they had to do under water, which rushed in as soon as the
door was opened, and in their awkward suits, which were provided with
apparatus for renewing the supply of oxygen; but at last they succeeded.

Then they clambered outside, and labored desperately to release the
vessel from the huge fragments of stone that pinned it down. Finally,
exhausted by their efforts, and unable to make any impression, they gave
up.

De Beauxchamps approached Cosmo and motioned to him that it was time to
ascend to the surface and leave the _Jules Verne_ to her fate. But Cosmo
signaled back that he wished first to examine more closely the strange
statue that was gazing upon them in the still unextinguished beam of the
searchlight with what they might now have regarded as a look of mockery.

The others, accordingly, waited while Cosmo Versál, greatly impeded by
his extraordinary garment, clambered up to the front of the figure.
There he saw something which redoubled his amazement.

On the broad breast he saw a representation of a world overwhelmed with
a deluge and encircling it was what he instantly concluded to be the
picture of a nebula. Underneath, in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, with
which Cosmo was familiar, was an inscription in letters of gold, which
could only be translated thus:

  I Come Again--
  At the End of Time.

"Great Heavens!" he said to himself. "It is a prophecy of the Second
Deluge!"

[Illustration: "IT IS A PROPHECY OF THE SECOND DELUGE."]

He continued to gaze, amazed, at the figure and the inscription, until
De Beauxchamps clambered to his side and indicated to him that it was
necessary that they should ascend without further delay, showing him by
signs that the air-renewing apparatus would give out.

With a last lingering look at the figure, Cosmo imitated the others by
detaching the weights from below his feet, and a minute later they were
all shooting rapidly toward the surface of the sea, De Beauxchamps, as
he afterwards declared, uttering a prayer for the repose of the _Jules
Verne_.

The imaginary time which Amos Blank had fixed as the limit set by Cosmo
for the return from the depths was nearly gone, and he was beginning to
cast about for some other invention to quiet the rising fears of the
passengers, when a form became visible which made the eyes of Captain
Arms, the first to catch sight of it, start from their sockets. He
rubbed them, and looked again--but there it was!

A huge head, human in outline, with bulging, glassy eyes, popped
suddenly out of the depths, followed by the upper part of a gigantic
form which was no less suggestive of a monstrous man, and which
immediately began to wave its arms!

Before the captain could collect his senses another shot to the surface,
and then another and another, until there were seven of them floating
and awkwardly gesticulating within a radius of a hundred fathoms on the
starboard side of the vessel.

The whole series of apparitions did not occupy more than a quarter of a
minute in making their appearance.

By the time the last had sprung into sight Captain Arms had recovered
his wits, and he shouted an order to lower a boat, at the same time
running down from the bridge to superintend the operation. Many of the
crew and passengers had in the meantime seen the strange objects, and
they were thrown into a state of uncontrollable excitement.

"It's them!" shouted the captain over his shoulder, in response to a
hundred inquiries all put at once, and forgetting his grammar in the
excitement. "They've come up in diving-suits."

Amos Blank comprehended the situation at once; and while the captain was
getting out the boat, he explained matters to the crowd.

"The submersible must be lost," he said quietly, "but the men have
escaped, so there is no great harm done. It does great credit to that
Frenchman that he should have been prepared for such an emergency. Those
are levium suits, and I've no doubt that he has got hydrogen somewhere
inside to increase their buoyancy."

Within a quarter of an hour all the seven had been picked up by the
boat, and it returned to the Ark. The strange forms were lifted aboard
with tackle to save time; and as the first one reached the deck, it
staggered about on its big limbs for a moment.

Then the metallic head opened, and the features of De Beauxchamps were
revealed.

Before anybody could assist him he had freed himself from the suit, and
immediately he began to aid the others. In ten minutes they all stood
safe and sound before the astonished eyes of the spectators. Cosmo had
suffered from the confinement, and he sank upon a seat, but De
Beauxchamps seemed to be the most affected. With downcast look he said,
sadly shaking his head:

"The poor _Jules Verne_! I shall never see her again."

"What has happened?" demanded Captain Arms.

"It was the Father of Horror," muttered Cosmo Versál.

"The Father of Horror--what's that?"

"Why, the Great Sphinx," returned Cosmo, gradually recovering his
breath. "Didn't you know that that was what the Arabs always called the
Sphinx?

"It was that which fell upon the submersible--split right open and
dropped its great chin upon us as we were sailing round it, and pinned
us fast. But the sight that we saw when the Sphinx fell apart! Tell
them, De Beauxchamps."

The Frenchman took up the narrative, while, with breathless attention,
passengers and crew crowded about to listen to his tale.

"When we got to the bottom," he said, "we first inspected the Great
Pyramid, going all round it with our searchlight. It was in good
condition, although the tide that had come up the Nile with the invasion
of the sea had washed away the sands to a great depth all about. When we
had completed the circuit of the pyramid, we saw the Sphinx, which had
been excavated by the water so that it stood up to its full height.

"We ran close around it, and when we were under the chin the whole
thing, saturated by the water, which no doubt caused an expansion
within--you know how many thousand years the gigantic idol had been
sun-dried--dropped apart.

"The submersible was caught by the falling mass, and partly crushed. We
labored for hours and hours to release the vessel, but there was little
that we could do. It almost broke my heart to think of leaving the
_Jules Verne_ there, but it had to be done.

"At last we put on the levium floating-suits, opened the cover at the
top, and came to the surface. The last thing I saw was the searchlight,
still burning, and illuminating the most marvelous spectacle that human
eyes ever gazed upon."

"Oh, what was it? What was it?" demanded a score of voices in chorus.

"It is impossible to describe it. It was the secret of old Egypt
revealed at last--at the end of the world!"

"But what was it like?"

"Like a glimpse into the remotest corridors of time," interposed Cosmo
Versál, with a curious look in his eyes.

"Some of you may have heard that long ago holes were driven through the
Sphinx in the hope of discovering something hidden inside, but they
missed the secret. The old god kept it well until his form fell apart.
We were pinned so close to it that we could not help seeing it, even in
the excitement of our situation.

"It had always been supposed that the Sphinx was the symbol of
something--it _was_, and more than a symbol! The explorers away back in
the nineteenth century who thought that they had found something
mysterious in the Great Pyramid went wide of the mark when they
neglected the Sphinx."

"But what did you see?"

_"We saw the prophecy of the Second Deluge,"_ said Cosmo, rising to his
feet, his piercing eyes aflame. "In the heart of the huge mass,
approachable, no doubt, by some concealed passage in the rock beneath,
known only to the priests, stood a gigantic idol, carved out of black
marble.

"It had enormous eyes of some gem that blazed in the electric beam from
the searchlight, with huge golden ears and beard, and on its breast was
a representation of a drowning world, with a great nebula sweeping over
it."

"It might have been a history instead of a prophecy," suggested one of
the listening savants. "Perhaps it only told what had once happened."

"No," replied Cosmo, shaking his big head. "It was a prophecy. Under it,
in ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics, which I recognized, was an
inscription which could only be translated by the words, 'I come
again--at the end of time!'"

There was a quality in Cosmo Versál's voice which made the hearers
shudder with horror.

"Yes," he added. "It comes again! The prophecy was hidden, but science
had its means of revelation, too, if the world would but have listened
to its voice. Even without the prophecy I have saved the flower of
mankind."




CHAPTER XXII

THE TERRIBLE NUCLEUS ARRIVES


When the company in the Ark had recovered from the astonishment produced
by the narratives of De Beauxchamps and Cosmo Versál, and particularly
the vivid description given by the latter of the strange idol concealed
in the breast of the "Father of Horror," and the inferences which he
drew concerning its prophetic character, the question again arose as to
their future course.

Captain Arms was still for undertaking to follow the trough of the Red
Sea, but Cosmo declared that this course would be doubly dangerous now
that the water had lowered and that they no longer had the _Jules Verne_
to act as a submarine scout, warning them of hidden perils.

They must now go by their own soundings, and this would be especially
dangerous in the close neighborhood of half-submerged mountains, whose
buttresses and foothills might rise suddenly out of the depths with
slopes so steep that the lead would afford no certain guidance.

It was first necessary to learn if possible the actual height of the
water, and whether it was still subsiding. It was partly for this
purpose that they had passed over Egypt instead of keeping directly on
toward the coast of lower Palestine.

But now Cosmo abandoned his purpose of taking his measurement by the aid
of Mount Sinai or some of its neighboring peaks, on account of the
dangerous character of that rugged region. If they had been furnished
with deep-sea sounding apparatus they might have made a direct
measurement of the depth in Egypt, but that was one of the few things
which Cosmo Versál had overlooked in furnishing the Ark, and such an
operation could not be undertaken.

He discovered that there was a mountain north of the Gulf of Akaba
having an elevation of 3,450 feet, and since this was 220 feet higher
than Monte Lauro, in Sicily, on which the Ark had grounded, he counted
on it as a gage which would serve his purpose.

So they passed almost directly over Suez, and about 120 miles farther
east they found the mountain they sought, rising to the west of the Wadi
el Arabia, a continuation of the depression at whose deepest point lay
the famous "Dead Sea," so often spoken of in the books of former times.

Here Cosmo was able to make a very accurate estimate from the height of
the peak above the water, and he was gratified to find that the
recession had not continued. The level of the water appeared to be
exactly the same as when they made their unfortunate excursion in the
direction of smoking Etna.

"It's all right," he said to Captain Arms. "We can get over into the
Syrian desert without much danger, although we must go slowly and
carefully until we are well past these ranges that come down from the
direction of the Dead Sea. After that I do not see that there is
anything in our way until we reach the ancient plains of Babylon."

King Richard, who was full of the history of the Crusades, as well as of
Bible narratives, wished to have the Ark turn northward, so that they
might sail over Jerusalem, and up the Valley of the Jordan within sight
of Mount Hermon and the Lebanon range.

Cosmo had had enough of that kind of adventure, while Captain Arms
declared that he would resign on the spot if there was to be any more
"fool navigating on mountain tops." But there were many persons in the
Ark who would have been very glad if King Richard's suggestion had been
carried out.

The feelings of some were deeply stirred when they learned that they
were now crossing the lower end of Palestine, and that the scenes of so
many incidents in the history of Abraham, Moses, and Joshua lay buried
beneath the blue water, whose almost motionless surface was marked with
a broad trail of foaming bubbles in the wake of the immense vessel.

Cosmo greatly regretted the absence of the submersible when they were
picking their way over this perilous region, but they encountered no
real difficulty, and at length found, by celestial observations, that
they were beyond all dangers and safely arrived over the deeply
submerged desert.

They kept on for several days toward the rising sun, and then Captain
Arms announced that the observations showed that they were over the site
of Babylon.

This happened just at the time of the midday dinner, and over the
dessert Cosmo seized the opportunity to make a little speech, which
could be heard by all in the saloon.

"We are now arrived," he said, "over the very spot where the descendants
of Noah are said to have erected a tower, known as the Tower of Babel,
and which they intended to build so high that it would afford a secure
refuge in case there should be another deluge.

"How vain were such expectations, if they were ever entertained, is
sufficiently shown by the fact that, at this moment, the water rolls
more than three thousand feet deep over the place where they put their
tower, and before the present deluge is over it will be thirty thousand
feet deep.

"More than half a mile beneath our feet lie the broad plains of Chaldea,
where tradition asserts that the study of astronomy began. It was
Berosus, a Chaldean, who predicted that there would come a second
deluge.

"It occurs to me, since seeing the astounding spectacle disclosed by the
falling apart of the Sphinx, that these people may have had an
infinitely more profound knowledge of the secrets of the heavens than
tradition has assigned to them.

"On the breast of the statue in the Sphinx was the figure of a crowned
man, encircled by a huge ring, and having behind him the form of a boat
containing two other human figures. The boat was represented as floating
in a flood of waters.

"Now, this corresponds exactly with figures that have been found among
the most ancient ruins in Chaldea. I regard that ring as symbolical of a
nebula enveloping the earth, and I think that the second deluge, which
we have lived to see, was foretold here thousands of years ago."

"Who foretold it first, then, the people who placed the statue in the
Sphinx, or these astronomers of Chaldea?" asked Professor Abel Able.

"I believe," Cosmo replied, "that the knowledge originated here, beneath
us, and that it was afterward conveyed to the Egyptians, who embodied it
in their great symbolical god."

"Are we to understand," demanded Professor Jeremiah Moses, "that this
figure was all that you saw on the breast of the statue, and that you
simply inferred that the ring represented a nebula?"

"Not at all," Cosmo replied. "The principal representation was that of a
world overwhelmed with a flood, and of a nebula descending upon it."

"How do you know that it was intended for a nebula?"

"Because it had the aspect of one, and it was clearly shown to be
descending from the high heavens."

"A cloud," suggested Professor Moses.

"No, not a cloud. Mark this, which is a marvel in itself: It had _the
form of a spiral nebula_. It was unmistakable."

At this point the discussion was interrupted by a call to Cosmo Versál
from Captain Arms on the bridge. He hastily left the table and ascended
to the captain's side.

He did not need to be told what to look for. Off in the north the sky
had become a solid black mass, veined with the fiercest lightning. The
pealing of the thunder came in a continuous roll, which soon grew so
loud as to shake the Ark.

"Up with the side-plates!" shouted Cosmo, setting twenty bells ringing
at once. "Close tight every opening! Screw down the port shutters!"

The crew of the Ark was, in a few seconds, running to and fro, executing
the orders that came in swift succession from the commander's bridge,
and the passengers were thrown into wild commotion. But nobody had time
to attend to them.

"It is upon us!" yelled Cosmo in the captain's ear, for the uproar had
become deafening. "The nucleus is here!"

The open promenade decks had not yet all been turned into inner
corridors when the downpour began upon the Ark. A great deal of water
found its way aboard, but the men worked with a will, as fearful for
their own safety as for that of others, and in a little while everything
had been made snug and tight.

In a short time a tremendous tempest was blowing, the wind coming from
the north, and the Ark, notwithstanding her immense breadth of beam, was
canted over to leeward at an alarming angle. On the larboard side the
waves washed to the top of the great elliptical dome and broke over it,
and their thundering blows shook the vessel to her center, causing many
to believe that she was about to founder.

The disorder was frightful. Men and women were flung about like tops,
and no one could keep his feet. Crash after crash, that could be heard
amid the howling of the storm, the battering of the waves, and the awful
roar of the deluge descending on the roof, told the fate of the
tableware and dishes that had been hastily left in the big dining
saloon.

Chairs recently occupied by the passengers on what had been the
promenade decks, and from which they had so serenely, if often
sorrowfully, looked over the broad, peaceful surface of the waters, were
now darting, rolling, tumbling, and banging about, intermingled with
rugs, hats, coats, and other abandoned articles of clothing.

The pitching and rolling of the Ark were so much worse than they had
been during the first days of the cataclysm, that Cosmo became very
solicitous about his collection of animals.

He hurried down to the animal deck, and found, indeed, that things were
in a lamentable shape. The trained keepers were themselves so much at
the mercy of the storm that they had had all they could do to save
themselves from being trampled to death by the frightened beasts.

The animals had been furnished with separate pens, but during the long
continued calm the keepers, for the sake of giving their charges greater
freedom and better air, had allowed many of them to go at large in the
broad central space around which the pens were placed, and the tempest
had come so unexpectedly that there had been no time to separate them
and get them back into their lodgings.

When Cosmo descended the scene that met his eyes caused him to cry out
in dismay, but he could not have been heard if he had spoken through a
trumpet. The noise and uproar were stunning, and the spectacle was
indescribable. The keepers had taken refuge on a kind of gallery running
round the central space, and were hanging on there for their lives.

Around them, on the railings, clinging with their claws, wildly flapping
their wings, and swinging with every roll of the vessel, were all the
fowls and every winged creature in the Ark except the giant turkeys,
whose power of wing was insufficient to lift them out of the męlée.

But all the four-footed beasts were rolling, tumbling, and struggling in
the open space below. With every lurch of the Ark they were swept across
the floor in an indistinguishable mass.

The elephants wisely did not attempt to get upon their feet, but allowed
themselves to slide from side to side, sometimes crushing the smaller
animals, and sometimes, in spite of all their efforts, rolling upon
their backs, with their titanic limbs swaying above them, and their
trunks wildly grasping whatever came within their reach.

The huge Californian cattle were in no better case, and the poor sheep
presented a pitiable spectacle as they were tumbled in woolly heaps from
side to side.

Strangest sight of all was that of the great Astoria turtles. They had
been pitched upon their backs and were unable to turn themselves over,
and their big carapaces served admirably for sliders.

They glided with the speed of logs in a chute, now this way, now that,
shooting like immense projectiles through the throng of struggling
beasts, cutting down those that happened to be upon their feet, and not
ending their course until they had crashed against the nearest wall.

As one of the turtles slid toward the bottom of the steps on which Cosmo
was clinging it cut under the legs of one of the giant turkeys, and the
latter, making a superphasianidaean effort, half leaped, half flapped
its way upon the steps to the side of Cosmo Versál, embracing him with
one of its stumpy wings, while its red neck and head, with bloodshot
eyes, swayed high above his bald dome.

The keepers gradually made their way round the gallery to Cosmo's side,
and he indicated to them by signs that they must quit the place with
him, and wait for a lull of the tempest before trying to do anything for
their charges.

A few hours later the wind died down, and then they collected all that
remained alive of the animals in their pens and secured them as best
they could against the consequences of another period of rolling and
pitching.

The experiences of the passengers had been hardly less severe, and panic
reigned throughout the Ark. After the lull came, however, some degree of
order was restored, and Cosmo had all who were in a condition to leave
their rooms assemble in the grand saloon, where he informed them of the
situation of affairs, and tried to restore their confidence. The roar on
the roof, in spite of the sound-absorbing cover which had been
re-erected, compelled him to use a trumpet.

"I do not conceal from you," he said in conclusion, "that the worst has
now arrived. I do not look for any cessation of the flood from the sky
until we shall have passed through the nucleus of the nebula. But the
Ark is a stout vessel, we are fully provisioned, and we shall get
through.

"All your chambers have been specially padded, as you may have remarked,
and I wish you to remain in them, only issuing when summoned for
assembly here.

"I shall call you out whenever the condition of the sea renders it safe
for you to leave your rooms. Food will be regularly served in your
quarters, and I beg you to have perfect confidence in me and my
assistants."

But the confidence which Cosmo Versál recommended to the others was
hardly shared by himself and Captain Arms. The fury of the blast which
had just left them had exceeded everything that Cosmo had anticipated,
and he saw that, in the face of such hurricanes, the Ark would be
practically unmanageable.

One of his first cares was to ascertain the rate at which the downpour
was raising the level of the water. This, too, surprised him. His gages
showed, time after time, that the rainfall was at the rate of about four
inches per minute. Sometimes it amounted to as much as six!

"The central part of the nebula," he said to the captain, through the
speaking-tube which they had arranged for their intercommunications on
the bridge, "is denser than I had supposed. The condensation is
enormous, but it is irregular, and I think it very likely that it is
more rapid in the north, where the front of the globe is plunging most
directly into the nebulous mass.

"From this we should anticipate a tremendous flow southward, which may
sweep us away in that direction. This will not be a bad thing for a
while, since it is southward that we must go in order to reach the
region of the Indian Ocean. But, in order not to be carried too rapidly
that way, I think it would be the best thing to point the Ark toward the
northeast."

"How am I to know anything about the points in this blackness?" growled
the captain.

"You must go the best you can by the compass," said Cosmo.

Cosmo Versál, as subsequently appeared, was right in supposing that the
nucleus of the nebula was exceedingly irregular in density. The
condensation was not only much heavier in the north, but it was very
erratic.

Some parts of the earth received a great deal more water from the opened
flood-gates above than others, and this difference, for some reason that
has never been entirely explained, was especially marked between the
eastern and western hemispheres.

We have already seen that when the downpour recommenced in Colorado it
was much less severe than during the first days of the flood. This
difference continued. It seems that all the denser parts of the nucleus
happened to encounter the planet on its eastern side.

This may have been partly due to the fact that as the rotating earth
moved on in its eastward motion round the sun the comparatively dense
masses of the nebula were always encountered at the times when the
eastern hemisphere was in advance. The fact, which soon became apparent
to Cosmo, that the downpour was always the most severe in the morning
hours, bears out this hypothesis.

It accords with what has been observed with respect to meteors, viz.,
that they are more abundant in the early morning. But then it must be
supposed that the condensed masses in the nebula were relatively so
small that they became successively exhausted, so to speak, before the
western hemisphere had come fairly into the line of fire.

Of course the irregularity in the arrival of the water did not, in the
end, affect the general level of the flood, which became the same all
over the globe, but it caused immense currents, as Cosmo had foreseen.

But there was one consequence which he had overlooked. The currents,
instead of sweeping the Ark continually southward, as he had
anticipated, formed a gigantic whirl, set up unquestionably by the great
ranges of the Himalayas, the Hindoo Koosh, and the Caucasus.

This tremendous maelstrom formed directly over Persia and Arabia, and,
turning in the direction of the hands of a watch, its influence extended
westward beyond the place where the Ark now was.

The consequence was that, in spite of all their efforts, Cosmo and the
captain found their vessel swept resistlessly up the course of the
valley containing the Euphrates and the Tigris.

They were unable to form an opinion of their precise location, but they
knew the general direction of the movement, and by persistent logging
got some idea of the rate of progress.

Fortunately the wind seldom blew with its first violence, but the
effects of the whirling current could be but little counteracted by the
utmost engine power of the Ark.

Day after day passed in this manner, although, owing to the density of
the rain, the difference between day and night was only perceptible by
the periodical changes from absolute blackness to a very faint
illumination when the sun was above the horizon.

The rise of the flood, which could not have been at a less rate than six
hundred feet every twenty-four hours, lifted the Ark above the level of
the mountains of Kurdistan by the time that they arrived over the upper
part of the Mesopotamian plain, and the uncertain observations which
they occasionally obtained of the location of the sun, combined with
such dead reckoning as they were able to make, finally convinced them
that they must certainly be approaching the location of the Black Sea
and the Caucasus range.

"I'll tell you what you're going to do," yelled Captain Arms. "You're
going to make a smash on old Ararat, where your predecessor, Noah, made
his landfall."

"_Trčs bien!_" shouted De Beauxchamps, who was frequently on the bridge,
and whose Gallic spirits nothing could daunt. "That's a good omen! M.
Versál should send out one of his turkeys to spy a landing place."

They were really nearer Ararat than they imagined, and Captain Arms's
prediction narrowly missed fulfillment. Within a couple of hours after
he had spoken a dark mass suddenly loomed through the dense air directly
in their track.

Almost at the same time, and while the captain was making desperate
efforts to sheer off, the sky lightened a little, and they saw an
immense heap of rock within a hundred fathoms of the vessel.

"Ararat, by all that's good!" yelled the captain. "Sta'board! Sta'board,
I tell you! Full power ahead!"

The Ark yielded slowly to her helm, and the screws whirled madly,
driving her rapidly past the rocks, so close that they might have tossed
a biscuit upon them. The set of the current also aided them, and they
got past the danger.

"Mountain navigation again!" yelled the captain. "Here we are in a nest
of these sky-shoals! What are you going to do now?"

"It is impossible to tell," returned Cosmo, "whether this is Great or
Little Ararat. The former is over 17,000 feet high, and the latter at
least 13,000. It is now twelve days since the flooding recommenced.

"If we assume a rise of 600 feet in twenty-four hours, that makes a
total of 7,200 feet, which, added to the 3,300 that we had before, gives
10,500 feet for the present elevation. This estimate may be considerably
out of the way.

"I feel sure that both the Ararats are yet well above the water line. We
must get out of this region as quickly as possible. Luckily the swirl of
the current is now setting us eastward. We are on its northern edge. It
will carry the Ark down south of Mount Demavend, and the Elburz range,
and over the Persian plateau, and if we can escape from it, as I hope,
by getting away over Beluchistan, we can go directly over India and
skirt the southern side of the Himalayas. Then we shall be near the goal
which we have had in mind."

"Bless me!" said the captain, staring with mingled admiration and doubt
at Cosmo Versál, "if you couldn't beat old Noah round the world, and
give him half the longitude. But I'd rather _you'd_ navigate this
hooker. The ghost of Captain Sumner itself couldn't work a traverse over
Beluchistan."

"You'll do it all right," returned Cosmo, "and the next time you drop
your anchor it will probably be on the head of Mount Everest."




CHAPTER XXIII

ROBBING THE CROWN OF THE WORLD


Now that they were going with the current instead of striving to stem
it, the Ark made much more rapid way than during the time that it was
drifting toward the Black Sea.

They averaged at least six knots, and, with the aid of the current,
could have done much better, but they thought it well to be cautious,
especially as they had so little means of guessing at their exact
location from day to day. The water was rough.

There was, most of the time, little wind, and often a large number of
the passengers assembled in the saloon.

The noise of the deluge on the roof was so much greater than it had been
at the start that it was difficult to converse, but there was plenty of
light, and they could, at least, see one another, and communicate by
signs if not very easily by the voice. Cosmo's library was well
selected, and many passed hours in reading stories of the world they
were to see no more!

King Richard and Amos Blank imitated Cosmo and the captain by furnishing
themselves with a speaking-tube, which they put alternately to their
lips and their ears, and thus held long conversations, presumably
exchanging with one another the secrets of high finance and kingly
government.

Both of them had enough historical knowledge and sufficient imagination
to be greatly impressed by the fact that they were drifting, amidst this
terrible storm, over the vast empire that Alexander the Great had
conquered.

They mused over the events of the great Macedonian's long marches
through deserts and over mountains, and the king, who loved the story of
these glories of the past, though he had cultivated peace in his own
dominions, often sighed while they recalled them to one another. Lord
Swansdown and the other Englishmen aboard seldom joined their king since
he had preferred the company of an untitled American to theirs.

The first named could not often have made a member of the party if he
had wished, for he kept his room most of the time, declaring that he had
never been so beastly seasick in his life. He thought that such an
abominable roller as the Ark should never have been permitted to go into
commission, don't you know.

On the morning of the twelfth day after they left the neighborhood of
Mount Ararat Captain Arms averred that their position must be somewhere
near longitude 69 degrees east, latitude 26 degrees north.

"Then you have worked your traverse over Beluchistan very well," said
Cosmo, "and we are now afloat above the valley of the River Indus. We
have the desert of northwestern India ahead, and from that locality we
can continue right down the course of the Ganges. In fact it would be
perfectly safe to turn northward and skirt the Himalayas within reach of
the high peaks. I think that's what I'll do."

"If you go fooling round any more peaks," shouted Captain Arms, in a
fog-horn voice, "you'll have to do your own steering! I've had enough of
that kind of navigation!"

Nevertheless when Cosmo Versál gave the order the captain turned the
prow of the Ark toward the presumable location of the great Himalayan
range, although the rebellion of his spirit showed in the erect set of
his whiskers. They were now entirely beyond the influence of the whirl
that had at first got them into trouble, and then helped them out of it,
in western Asia.

Behind the barrier of the ancient "Roof of the World" the sea was
relatively calm, although, at times, they felt the effect of currents
pouring down from the north, which had made their way through the lofty
passes from the Tibetan side.

Cosmo calculated from his estimate of the probable rate of rise of the
flood and from the direction and force of the currents that all but the
very highest of the Pamirs must already be submerged.

It was probable, he thought, that the water had attained a level of
between seventeen and eighteen thousand feet. This, as subsequent events
indicated, was undoubtedly an underestimate. The downpour in the north
must have been far greater than Cosmo thought, and the real height of
the flood was considerably in excess of what he supposed.

If they could have seen some of the gigantic peaks as they approached
the mountains in the eastern Punjab, south of Cashmere, they would have
been aware of the error.

As it was, owing to the impossibility of seeing more than a short
distance even when the light was brightest, they kept farther south than
was really necessary, and after passing, as they believed, over Delhi,
steered south by east, following substantially the course that Cosmo had
originally named along the line of the Ganges valley.

They were voyaging much slower now, and after another ten days had
passed an unexpected change came on. The downpour diminished in
severity, and at times the sun broke forth, and for an hour or two the
rain would cease entirely, although the sky had a coppery tinge, and at
night small stars were not clearly visible.

Cosmo was greatly surprised at this. He could only conclude that the
central part of the nebula had been less extensive, though more dense,
than he had estimated. It was only thirty-four days since the deluge had
recommenced, and unless present appearances were deceptive, its end
might be close at hand.

Captain Arms seized the opportunity to make celestial and solar
observations which delighted his seaman's heart, and with great glee he
informed Cosmo that they were in longitude 88 degrees 20 minutes east,
latitude 24 degrees 15 minutes north, and he would stake his reputation
as a navigator upon it.

"Almost exactly the location of Moorshedabad, in Bengal," said Cosmo,
consulting his chart. "The mighty peak of Kunchingunga is hardly more
than two hundred miles toward the north, and Mount Everest, the highest
point in the world, is within a hundred miles of that!"

"But you're not going skimming around _them_!" cried the captain with
some alarm.

"I shall, if the sky continues in its present condition, go as far as
Darjeeling," replied Cosmo. "Then we can turn eastward and get over
upper Burmah and so on into China. From there we can turn north again.

"I think we can manage to get into Tibet somewhere between the ranges.
It all depends upon the height of the water, and that I can ascertain
exactly by getting a close look at Kunchingunga. I would follow the line
of the Brahmaputra River if I dared, but the way is too beset with
perils."

"I think you've made a big mistake," said the captain. "Why didn't you
come directly across Russia, after first running up to the Black Sea
from the Mediterranean, and so straight into Tibet?"

"I begin to think that that's what I ought to have done," responded
Cosmo, thoughtfully, "but when we started the water was not high enough
to make me sure of that route, and after we got down into Egypt I didn't
want to run back. But I guess it would have been better."

"Better a sight than steering among these five-mile peaks," growled
Captain Arms. "How high does Darjeeling lie? I don't want to run aground
again."

"Oh, that's perfectly safe," responded Cosmo. "Darjeeling is only about
7,350 feet above the old sea-level. I think we can go almost to the foot
of Kunchingunga without any danger."

"Well, the name sounds dangerous enough in itself," said the captain,
"but I suppose you'll have your way. Give me the bearings and we'll be
off."

They took two days to get to the location of Darjeeling, for at times
the sky darkened and the rain came down again in tremendous torrents.
But these spells did not last more than two or three hours, and the
weather cleared between them.

As soon as they advanced beyond Darjeeling, keeping a sharp outlook for
Kunchingunga, Cosmo began to perceive the error of his calculation of
the height of the flood.

The mountain should still have projected more than three thousand feet
above the waves, allowing that the average rise during the thirty-six
days since the recommencement of the flood had been six hundred feet a
day.

But, in fact, they did not see it at all, and thought at first that it
had been totally submerged. At last they found it, a little rocky
island, less than two hundred feet above the water, according to Cosmo's
careful measure, made from a distance of a quarter of a mile.

"This is great news for us," he exclaimed, as soon as he had completed
the work. "This will save us a long journey round. The water must now
stand at about 27,900 feet, and although there are a considerable number
of peaks in the Himalayas approaching such an elevation, there are only
three or four known to reach or exceed it, of which Kunchingunga is one.

"We can, then, run right over the roof of the world, and there we'll be,
in Tibet. Then we can determine from what side it is safest to approach
Mount Everest, for I am very desirous to get near that celebrated peak,
and, if possible, see it go under."

"But the weather isn't safe yet," objected Captain Arms. "Suppose we
should be caught in another downpour, and everything black about us! I'm
not going to navigate this ship by searchlight among mountains
twenty-eight thousand feet tall, when the best beam that ever shot from
a mirror won't show an object a hundred fathoms away."

"Very well," Cosmo replied, "we'll circle around south for a few days
and see what will happen. I think myself that it's not quite over yet.
The fact is, I hope it isn't, for now that it has gone so far, I'd like
to see the top-knot of the earth covered."

"Well, it certainly couldn't do any more harm if it got up as high as
the moon," responded the captain.

They spent four days sailing to and fro over India, and during the first
three of those days there were intermittent downpours. But the whole of
the last period of twenty-four hours was entirely without rain, and the
color of the sky changed so much that Cosmo declared he would wait no
longer.

"Everest," he said, "is only 940 feet higher than Kunchingunga, and it
may be sunk out of sight before we can get there."

"Do you think the water is still rising?" asked De Beauxchamps, while
King Richard and Amos Blank listened eagerly for the reply, for now that
the weather had cleared, the old company was all assembled on the
bridge.

"Yes, slowly," said Cosmo. "There is a perceptible current from the
north which indicates that condensation is still going on there. You'll
see that it'll come extremely close to the six miles I predicted before
it's all over."

By the time they had returned to the neighborhood of the mountains the
sky had become blue, with only occasionally a passing sunshower, and
Cosmo ordered the promenades to be thrown open, and the passengers, with
great rejoicings, resumed their daily lounging and walking on deck.

It required a little effort of thought to make them realize their
situation, but when they did it grew upon them until they could not
sufficiently express their wonder.

Here they were, on an almost placid sea, with tepid airs blowing gently
in their faces, and a scorching sun overhead, whose rays had to be
shielded off, floating over the highest pinnacles of the roof of the
world, the traditional "Abode of Snow!"

All around them, beneath the rippled blue surface, lined here and there
with little white windrows of foam, stood submerged peaks, 24,000,
25,000, 26,000, 27,000, 28,000 feet in elevation! They sailed over their
summits and saw them not.

All began now to sympathize with Cosmo's desire to find Everest before
it should have disappeared with its giant brothers. Its location was
accurately known from the Indian government surveys, and Captain Arms
had every facility for finding the exact position of the Ark. They
advanced slowly toward the northwest, a hundred glasses eagerly scanning
the horizon ahead.

Finally, at noon on the third day of their search, the welcome cry of
"Land ho!" came down from the cro'nest. Captain Arms immediately set his
course for the landfall, and in the course of a little more than an hour
had it broad abeam.

"It's Everest, without question," said Cosmo. "It's the crown of the
world."

But how strange was its appearance! A reddish-brown mass of rock, rising
abruptly out of the blue water, really a kind of crown in form, but not
more than a couple of square rods in extent, and about three feet high
at its loftiest point.

There was no snow, of course, for that had long since disappeared, owing
to the rise of temperature, and no snow would have fallen in that
latitude now, even in mid-winter, because the whole base of the
atmosphere had been lifted up nearly six miles.

Sea-level pressures were prevailing where the barometric column would
once have dropped almost to the bottom of its tube. It was all that was
left of the world!

North of them, under the all-concealing ocean, lay the mighty plateau of
Tibet; far toward the east was China, deeply buried with its 500,000,000
of inhabitants; toward the south lay India, over which they had so long
been sailing; northwestward the tremendous heights of the Pamir region
and of the Hindu-Kush were sunk beneath the sea.

"When this enormous peak was covered with snow," said Cosmo, "its height
was estimated at 29,002 feet, or almost five and three-quarter miles.
The removal of the snow has, of course, lowered it, but I think it
probable that this point, being evidently steep on all sides, and of
very small area, was so swept by the wind that the snow was never very
deep upon it.

"If we allow ten, or even twenty feet for the snow, the height of this
rock cannot be much less than 29,000 feet above the former sea-level.
But I do not dare to approach closer, because Everest had a broad
summit, and we might possibly ground upon a sharp ridge."

"And you are sure that the water is still rising?" asked De Beauxchamps
again.

"Watch and you will see," Cosmo responded.

The Ark was kept circling very slowly within a furlong of the rocky
crown, and everybody who had a glass fixed his eyes upon it.

"The peak is certainly sinking," said De Beauxchamps at last. "I believe
it has gone down three inches in the last fifteen minutes."

"Keep your eyes fixed on some definite point," said Cosmo to the others
who were looking, "and you will easily note the rise of the water."

They watched it until nobody felt any doubt. Inch by inch the crown of
the world was going under. In an hour Cosmo's instruments showed that
the highest point had settled to a height of but two feet above the sea.

"But when will the elevation that you have predicted begin?" asked one.

"Its effects will not become evident immediately," Cosmo replied. "It
may possibly already have begun, but if so, it is masked by the
continued rise of the water."

"And how long shall we have to wait for the re-emergence of Tibet?"

"I cannot tell, but it will be a long time. But do not worry about that.
We have plenty of provisions, and the weather will continue fine after
the departure of the nebula."

They circled about until only a foot or so of the rock remained above
the reach of the gently washing waves. Suddenly struck by a happy
thought, De Beauxchamps exclaimed:

"I must have a souvenir from the crown of the disappearing world. M.
Versál, will you permit me to land upon it with one of your boats?"

De Beauxchamps's suggestion was greeted with cheers, and twenty others
immediately expressed a desire to go.

"No," said Cosmo to the eager applicants, "it is M. De Beauxchamps's
idea; let him go alone. Yes," he continued, addressing the Frenchman,
"you can have a boat, and I will send two men with you to manage it.
You'd better hurry, or there will be nothing left to land upon."

The necessary orders were quickly given, and in five minutes De
Beauxchamps, watched by envious eyes, was rapidly approaching the
disappearing rock. They saw him scramble out upon it, and they gave a
mighty cheer as he waved his hand at them.

He had taken a hammer with him, and with breathless interest they
watched him pounding and prying about the rock. They could see that he
selected the very highest point for his operations.

While he worked away, evidently filling his pockets, the interest of the
onlookers became more and more intense.

"Look out!" they presently began to shout at him, "you will be caught by
the water."

But he paid no attention, working with feverish rapidity. Suddenly the
watchers saw a little ripple break over the last speck of dry land on
the globe, and De Beauxchamps standing up to his shoe-laces in water.
Cries of dismay came from the Ark. De Beauxchamps now gave over his
work, and, with apparent reluctance, entered the boat, which was rowed
close up to the place where he was standing.

As the returning boat approached the Ark, another volley of cheers broke
forth, and the Frenchman, standing up to his full height, waved with a
triumphant air something that sparkled brilliantly in the sunshine.

"I congratulate you, M. De Beauxchamps," cried Cosmo, as the adventurer
scrambled aboard. "You have stood where no human foot has ever been
before, and I see that you have secured your souvenir of the world that
was."

"Yes," responded De Beauxchamps exultantly, "and see what it is--a
worthy decoration for such a coronet."

He held up his prize, amid exclamations of astonishment and admiration
from those who were near enough to see it.

"The most beautiful specimen of amethyst I ever beheld!" cried a
mineralogist enthusiastically, taking it from De Beauxchamps's hand.
"What was the rock?"

"Unfortunately, I am no mineralogist," replied the Frenchman, "and I
cannot tell you, but these gems were abundant. I could have almost
filled the boat if I had had time.

"The amethyst," he added gayly, "is the traditional talisman against
intoxication, but, although these adorned her tiara, the poor old world
has drunk her fill."

"But it is only water," said Cosmo, smiling.

"Too much, at any rate," returned the Frenchman.

"I should say," continued the mineralogist, "that the rock was some
variety of syenite, from its general appearance."

"I know nothing of that," replied De Beauxchamps, "but I have the jewels
of the terrestrial queen, and," he continued gallantly, "I shall have
the pleasure of bestowing them upon the ladies."

He emptied his pockets, and found that he had enough to give every woman
aboard the Ark a specimen, with several left over for some of the men,
Cosmo, of course, being one of the recipients.

"There," said De Beauxchamps, as he handed the stone to Cosmo, "there is
a memento from the Gaurisankar."

"I beg your pardon--Mount Everest, if you please," interposed Edward
Whistlington.

"No," responded the Frenchman stoutly, "it is the Gaurisankar. Why will
you English persist in renaming everything in the world? Gaurisankar is
the native name, and, in my opinion, far more appropriate and euphonious
than Everest."

This discussion was not continued, for now everybody became interested
in the movements of the Ark. Cosmo had decided that it would be safe to
approach close to the point where the last peak of the mountain had
disappeared.

Cautiously they drew nearer and nearer, until, looking through the
wonderfully transparent water, they caught sight of a vast precipice
descending with frightful steepness, down and down, until all was lost
in the profundity beneath.

The point on which De Beauxchamps had landed was now covered so deep
that the water had ceased to swirl about it, but lay everywhere in an
unbroken sheet, which was every moment becoming more placid and
refulgent in the sunshine.

The world was drowned at last! As they looked abroad over the convex
surface, they thought, with a shudder, that now the earth, seen from
space, was only a great, glassy ball, mirroring the sun and the stars.

But they were ignorant of what had happened far in the west!




CHAPTER XXIV

THE FRENCHMAN'S NEW SCHEME


After the disappearance of Mt. Everest, Cosmo Versál made a careful
measurement of the depth of water on the peak, which he found to be
forty feet, and then decided to cruise eastward with the Ark, sailing
slowly, and returning after a month to see whether by that time there
would be any indications of the reappearance of land.

No part of his extraordinary theory of the deluge was more
revolutionary, or scientifically incredible, than this idea that the
continents would gradually emerge again, owing to internal stresses set
up in the crust of the earth.

This, he anticipated, would be caused by the tremendous pressure of the
water, which must be ten or twelve miles deep over the greatest
depressions of the old ocean-bottoms. He expected that geological
movements would attend the intrusion of the water into subterranean
cavities and into the heated magma under volcanic regions.

He often debated the question with the savants aboard the Ark, and,
despite their incredulity, he persisted in his opinion. He could not be
shaken, either, in his belief that the first land to emerge would be the
Himalayas, the Pamirs, and the plateau of Tibet.

"We may have to wait some years before any considerable area is
exposed," he admitted, "but it must not be forgotten that what land does
first appear above the water will lie at the existing sea-level, and
will have an oceanic climate, suitable for the rapid development of
plants.

"We have aboard all things needed for quick cultivation, and in one
season we could begin to raise crops."

"But at first," said Professor Jeremiah Moses, "only mountain tops will
emerge, and how can you expect to cultivate them?"

"There is every probability," replied Cosmo, "that even the rocks of a
mountain will be sufficiently friable after their submergence to be
readily reduced to the state of soil, especially with the aid of the
chemical agents which I have brought along, and I have no fear that I
could not, in a few weeks, make even the top of Everest fertile.

"I anticipate, in fact, that it will be on that very summit that we
shall begin the re-establishment of the race. Then, as the plateaus
below come to the surface, we can gradually descend and enlarge the
field of our operations."

"Suppose Everest should be turned into a volcano?"

"That cannot happen," said Cosmo. "A volcano is built up by the
extrusion of lava and cinders from below, and these cannot break forth
at the top of a mountain already formed, especially when that mountain
has no volcanic chimney and no crater, and Everest had neither."

"If the lowering of the flood that caused our stranding on a mountain
top in Sicily was due to the absorption of water into the interior of
the crust, why may not that occur again, and thus bring the Himalayas
into view, without any rising on their part?" demanded Professor Moses.

"I think," said Cosmo, "that all the water that could enter the crust
has already done so, during the time that the depression of level which
so surprised us was going on. Now we must wait for geologic changes,
resulting from the gradual yielding of the internal mass to the new
forces brought to bear upon it.

"As the whole earth has gained in _weight_ by the condensation of the
nebula upon it, its plastic crust will proportionally gain in _girth_ by
internal expansion, which will finally bring all the old continents to
the surface, but Asia first of all."

Whether Cosmo Versál's hypotheses were right or wrong, he always had a
reply to any objection, and the prestige which he had gained by his
disastrously correct theory about the watery nebula gave him an
advantage so enormous that nobody felt enough confidence in himself to
stand long against anything that he might advance.

Accordingly, everybody in the Ark found himself looking forward to the
re-emergence of Mount Everest almost as confidently as did their leader,
Cosmo Versál.

They began their waiting voyage by sailing across the plateau of Tibet
and the lofty chain of the Yung-ling Mountains out over China.

The interest of all aboard was excited to the highest degree when they
found themselves sailing over the mighty domains of the Chinese
President-Emperor, who had developed an enormous power, making him the
ruler of the whole eastern world.

He, with his half-billion or more of subjects, now reposed at the bottom
of an ocean varying from three to five or six miles in depth. Deep
beneath the Ark lay the broad and once populous valleys of the
Yangtse-Kiang and the Hoang-Ho, the "Scourge of China."

Finally they swung round northward and re-entered the region of Tibet,
seeking once more the drowned crown of the world. In the meantime Cosmo
had had the theatrical exhibitions and the concerts resumed in the
evenings, and sometimes there was music, and even dancing on the long
promenades, open to the outer air.

Let not that be a matter of surprise or blame, for the spirit of joy in
life is unconquerable, as it should be if life is worth while. So it
happened that, not infrequently, and not with any blameworthy intention,
or in any spirit of heartless forgetfulness, this remarkable company of
world-wanderers drifted, in the moonlight, above the universal watery
grave of the drowned millions, with the harmonies of stringed
instruments stealing out upon the rippling waves, and the soft sound of
swiftly shuffling feet tripping over the smooth decks.

Costaké Theriade and Sir Wilfrid Athelstone resumed their stormy efforts
to talk each other down, but now even Cosmo was seldom a listener,
except when he had to interfere to keep the peace.

King Richard and Amos Blank, however, usually heard them out, but it was
evident from their expressions that they enjoyed the prospective
fisticuffs rather more than the exposition of strange scientific
doctrines.

Perhaps the happiest man aboard was Captain Arms. At last he could make
as many and as certain observations as he chose, and he studied the
charts of Asia until he declared that now he knew the latitude and
longitude of the mountains better than he did those of the seaports of
the old oceans.

He had not the least difficulty in finding the location of Mount Everest
again, and when he announced that they were floating over it, Cosmo
immediately prepared to make another measurement of the depth of water
on the peak. The result was hardly gratifying. He found that it had
diminished but four inches. He said to Captain Arms:

"The range is rising, but less rapidly than I hoped. Even if the present
rate should be doubled it would require five years for the emergence of
the highest point. Instead of remaining in this part of the world we
shall have an abundance of time to voyage round the earth, going
leisurely, and when we get back again perhaps there will be enough land
visible to give us a good start."

"Mr. Versál," said the captain, "you remember that you promised me that
I should drop my anchor on the head of Mount Everest if I worked a
traverse across Beluchistan."

"Certainly I remember it; and also that you were not much disposed to
undertake the task. However, you did it well, and I suppose that now you
want me to fulfill the bargain?"

"Exactly," replied the captain. "I'd just like to get a mud-hook in the
top-knot of the earth. I reckon that that'll lay over all the sea yarns
ever spun."

"Very well," returned Cosmo. "Try it, if you've got cable enough."

"Enough and to spare," cried the captain, "and I'll have the
Gaurisankar, as the Frenchman calls it, hooked in a jiffy."

This was an operation which called everybody to the rails to watch
it. Hundreds of eyes tried to follow the anchor as it descended
perpendicularly upon the mountain-top, nearly forty feet beneath.
Through the clear water they could dimly see the dark outline of the
summit below, and they gazed at it with wonder, and a sort of terror.

Somehow they felt that never before had they fully appreciated the awful
depths over which they had been floating. The anchor steadily dropped
until it rested on the rock.

It got a hold finally, and in a few minutes the great vessel was
swinging slowly round, held by a cable whose grasp was upon the top of
the world! When the sensation had been sufficiently enjoyed the anchor
was tripped, and the nose of the Ark was turned northwestward. Cosmo
Versál announced his intention to circumnavigate the drowned globe.

The news of what they were about to do was both welcome and saddening to
the inmates of the vessel. They wished to pass once more over the lands
where they had first seen the light, and at the same time they dreaded
the memories that such a voyage would inevitably bring back with
overwhelming force. But, at any rate, it would be better than drifting
for years over Tibet and China.

While everybody else was discussing the prospects of the new voyage, and
wondering how long it would last, Yves de Beauxchamps was concentrating
all his attention upon a new project which had sprung up in his active
mind as soon as Cosmo's intention was announced. He took Cosmo aside and
said to him:

"M. Versál, the dearest memory that I have treasured in my heart is that
of the last sight of my drowned home, my beautiful dead Paris. It may be
that the home-loving instincts of my race arouse in me a melancholy
pleasure over such a sight which would not be shared by you, of a
different blood; but if, perchance, you do share my feelings on this
subject I believe that I can promise you a similar visit to the great
metropolis where your life began, and where you executed those labors
whose result has been to preserve a remnant of humanity to repeople the
earth."

Cosmo Versál's quick intelligence instantly comprehended the Frenchman's
design, but it startled him, and apparently insuperable difficulties at
once occurred to his mind.

"M. De Beauxchamps," he responded, grasping his friend warmly by the
hand, "I thank you from the bottom of my heart for your amiable
intention, and I assure you that nothing could afford me greater
satisfaction than to see once more that mighty city, even though it can
now be but an awful ruin, tenanted by no life except the terrible
creatures of the deep. But, while I foresee what your plan must be, I
can hardly conceive that its execution could be possible. You are
thinking, of course, of constructing a diving apparatus capable of
penetrating to a depth of nearly six miles in the sea. Setting aside the
question whether we could find in the stores of the Ark the materials
that would be needed, it appears to me most improbable that we could
make the apparatus of sufficient strength to withstand the pressure, and
could then cause it to sink to so great a depth, and afterward bring it
safely to the surface."

The Frenchman smiled.

"M. Versál," he replied, "I have taken the liberty to look over the
stock of materials which you have so wisely prepared for possible
repairs to the Ark and for use after the Ark lands, and I know that
among them I can find all that I shall need. You yourself know how
completely you are provided with engineering tools and machines of all
kinds. You have even an electric foundry aboard. With the aid of your
mechanical genius, and the skill of your assistants, together with that
of my own men, who are accustomed to work of this kind, I have not the
faintest doubt that I can design and construct a diving-bell, large
enough to contain a half-dozen persons, and perfectly capable of
penetrating to any depth. Of course I cannot make it of levium, but you
have a sufficient supply of herculeum steel, the strength of which is so
immense that the walls of the bell can be made to remit the pressure
even at a depth of six miles. From my previous experiments I am
confident that there will be no difficulty in sinking and afterward
raising this apparatus. It is only necessary that the mean specific
gravity of the bell shall be greater than that of the water at a given
depth, and you know that as far back as the end of the nineteenth
century your own countrymen sent down sounding apparatus more than six
miles in the Pacific Ocean, near the island of Guam."

"But the air inside the bell--" Cosmo began.

"Excuse me," interrupted De Beauxchamps, "but that air need be under no
greater pressure than at the surface. I shall know how to provide for
that. Remember the _Jules Verne_. Simply give me _carte blanche_ in this
matter, let me have the materials to work with, afford me the advantage
of your advice and assistance whenever I shall need them, and I promise
you that by the time we have arrived over the site of New York we shall
be prepared for the descent."

Cosmo was deeply impressed by the Frenchman's enthusiastic
self-confidence. He had a great admiration for the constructor of the
_Jules Verne_, and, besides, the proposed adventure was exactly after
his own heart. After meditating a while, he said heartily:

"Well, M. De Beauxchamps, I give my consent. Everything you wish shall
be at your disposal, and you can begin as soon as you choose. Only, let
the thing be kept a secret between us and the workmen who are employed.
If it should turn out a failure it would not do that the people in the
Ark should be aware of it. I can give you a working room on one of the
lower decks, where there will be no interference with your proceedings,
and no knowledge of what you are about can leak out."

"That is exactly what I should wish," returned De Beauxchamps, smiling
with delight, "and I renew my promise that you shall not be
disappointed."

So, without a suspicion of what was going on entering the minds of any
person in the great company outside the small company of men who were
actually employed in the work, the construction of De Beauxchamps's
great diving-bell was begun, and pushed with all possible speed,
consistent with the proper execution of the work. In the meantime the
Ark continued its course toward the west.

They ran slowly, for there was no hurry, and the Ark had now become to
its inhabitants as a house and a home--their only foothold on the whole
round earth, and that but a little floating island of buoyant metal.
They crossed the Pamirs and the Hindu-Kush, the place where the Caspian
Sea had been swallowed up in the universal ocean, and ran over Ararat,
which three months before had put them into such fearful danger, but
whose loftiest summit now lay twelve thousand feet beneath their keel.

At length, after many excursions toward the north and toward the south,
in the halcyon weather that had seldom failed since the withdrawal of
the nebula, they arrived at the place (or above it) which had stood
during centuries for a noon-mark on the globe.

It was midday when Captain Arms, having made his observations, said to
Cosmo and the others on the bridge:

"Noon at Greenwich, and noon on the Ark. Latitude, fifty-one degrees
thirty minutes. That brings you as nearly plumb over the place as you'd
be likely to hit it. Right down there lies the old observatory that set
the chronometers of the world, and kept the clocks and watches up to
their work."

King Richard turned aside upon hearing the captain's words. They brought
a too vivid picture of the great capital, six miles under their feet,
and a too poignant recollection of the disastrous escape of the royal
family from overwhelmed London seven months before.

As reckoned by the almanac, it was the 15th of September, more than
sixteen months since Cosmo had sent out his first warning to the public,
when the Ark crossed the meridian of seventy-four degrees west, in about
forty-one degrees north latitude, and the adventurers knew that New York
was once more beneath them.

There was great emotion among both passengers and crew, for the majority
of them had either dwelt in New York or been in some way associated with
its enterprises and its people, and, vain as must be the hope of seeing
any relic of the buried metropolis, every eye was on the alert.

They looked off across the boundless sea in every direction,
interrogating every suspicious object on the far horizon, and even
peering curiously into the blue abyss, as if something might suddenly
appear there which would speak to them like a voice from the past.

But they saw only shafts of sunlight running into bottomless depths, and
occasionally some oceanic creature floating lazily far below. The color
of the sea was wonderful. It had attracted their attention after the
submergence of Mount Everest, but at that time it had not yet assumed
its full splendor.

At first, no doubt, there was considerable dissolved matter in the
water, but gradually this settled, and the sea became bluer and
bluer--not the deep indigo of the old ocean, but a much lighter and more
brilliant hue--and here, over the site of New York, the waters were of a
bright, luminous sapphire, that dazzled the eye.

Cosmo declared that the change of the sea-color was undoubtedly due to
some quality in the nebula from whose condensation the water had been
produced, but neither his own analyses, nor those of the chemists aboard
the Ark, were able to detect the subtle element to whose presence the
peculiar tint was due.

But whatever it may have been, it imparted to the ocean an ethereal,
imponderous look, which was sometimes startling. There were moments when
they almost expected to see it expand back into the nebulous form and
fly away.




CHAPTER XXV

NEW YORK IN HER OCEAN TOMB


During the long voyage from the sunken Himalayas to still deeper sunken
New York, De Beauxchamps, with his fellow-countrymen and the skilled
mechanics assigned by Cosmo Versál to aid them, had finished the
construction of the huge diving-bell. No one not in the secret had the
slightest idea of what had been done, owing to the remote situation of
the deck on which the construction was carried out.

Now, while a thousand pairs of eyes were interrogating the smooth
surface of the sea, and striving to penetrate its cerulean depths, a
great surprise was sprung upon the passengers. The rear gangway of the
lowest deck was cleared, a heavy crane-like beam was set projecting over
the water, and men began to rig a flexible cable, which had been
specially prepared for the purpose of lowering the bell into the depths,
and of raising it again when the adventurers should wish to return to
the surface. Everybody's attention was immediately attracted to these
strange preparations, and the utmost curiosity was aroused. A chorus of
wondering exclamations broke out when a metallic globe, twenty feet in
diameter, and polished until it shone like a giant thermometer bulb, was
rolled out and carefully attached to the cable by means of a strong ring
set in one side of the bell. The excitement of the passengers would soon
have become uncontrollable if Cosmo had not at this point summoned the
entire ship's company into the great saloon. As soon as all were
assembled he mounted his dais and began to speak.

"My fellow-citizens of the old world, which has perished, and of the
new, which is to take its place," he said, "we owe to the genius of M.
De Beauxchamps an apparatus which is about to enable us to inspect, by
an actual visit, the remains of the vast metropolis, which we saw in all
its majesty and beauty but so few months ago, and which now lies forever
silent at the bottom of this universal ocean.

"If it were practicable I should wish to afford to every one of you a
farewell glimpse of that mighty city, to which the hearts of so many
here are bound, but you can readily understand that that would be
impossible. Only six persons can go in this exploring bell, and they
have been chosen; but a faithful account will be brought back to you of
all that they see and learn. The adventuring company will consist of M.
De Beauxchamps, M. Pujol, his first assistant, Mr. Amos Blank, King
Richard, Professor Abel Able, and myself. Captain Arms has ascertained
the location of the center of Manhattan Island, over which we are now
floating. The quietness of the sea, the absence of any apparent current,
and the serenity of the heavens are favoring circumstances, which may be
relied upon to enable Captain Arms to keep the Ark constantly poised
almost precisely over our point of descent. It is not possible to
predict the exact duration of our absence in the depths, but it will
not, in any case, exceed about twenty hours.

"Once arrived at the bottom, nearly six miles down, we shall attach the
cable to some secure anchorage, by means of a radio-control, operated
from within the bell, and then, with the bell free, we shall make
explorations, as extensive as possible. The radio-control of which I
have spoken governs also the attachment of the cable to the bell. This
appliance has been prepared and tested with such care that we have no
doubt of its entire efficiency. I mention these things in order to
remove from your minds any fear as to the success of our enterprise.

"The bell being once detached, we shall be able to move it from point to
point by means of a pair of small propellers, which you will perceive on
the outside of the bell, and which are also controlled from within.
These will be used to increase our speed of descent. From a calculation
of the density of the sea-water at the depth to which we shall descend,
we estimate that the bell with its contents will press upon the bottom
with a gravitational force of only five pounds, so that it will move
with very slight effort, and may even, when in motion, float like a
fish.

"For the purposes of observation we have provided, on four sides of the
bell, a series of circular windows, with glass of immense thickness and
strength, but of extraordinary transparency. Through these windows we
shall be able to see in almost all directions. It was our intention to
provide wireless telephone apparatus with which we might have kept you
informed of all our doings and discoveries, but unfortunately we have
found it impracticable to utilize our control for that purpose. We
shall, however, be able to send and receive signals as long as we are
connected with the cable.

"I should add that the construction of the bell, although suggested by
M. De Beauxchamps immediately after our departure from Mount Everest,
has been carried on in secret simply because we did not wish to subject
you to the immense disappointment which you would certainly have
experienced if this brilliant conception of our gifted friend, after
being once made known to you, had proved to be a failure. Our
preparations have all been made, and within an hour we shall begin the
descent."

It is quite impossible to describe the excitement of the passengers
while they listened to this extraordinary communication. When Cosmo
Versál had finished speaking he stood for some minutes looking at his
audience with a triumphant smile. First a murmur of excited voices
arose, and then somebody proposed three cheers, which were given and
repeated until the levium dome rang with the reverberations. Nobody knew
exactly why he was cheering, but the infectious enthusiasm carried
everything before it. Then the crowd began to ask questions, addressed
not to Cosmo but to one another. The wildest suggestions were made. One
woman who had left some treasured heirlooms in a Fifth Avenue mansion
demanded of her husband that he should commission Cosmo Versál to
recover them.

"I'm sure they're there," she insisted. "They were locked in the safe."

"But, don't you see," protested the poor man, "he can't get outside of
that bell to get 'em."

"I don't see _why_ he can't, if he should really try. I think it's too
mean! They were my grandmother's jewels."

"But, my dear, how could he get out?"

"Well, _how does he get in?_ What's his radio-control good for; won't
that help him? What is he going down there for if he can't do a little
thing like that, to oblige?"

She pouted at her husband because he persistently refused to present her
request to Cosmo, and declared that she would do it herself, then, for
she must have those jewels, now that they were so near.

But Cosmo was saved from this, and other equally unreasonable demands,
by a warning from De Beauxchamps that all was ready, and that no time
should be lost. Then everybody hastened out on the decks to watch the
departure of the adventurers. Many thoughtfully shook their heads,
predicting that they would never be seen again. As soon as this feeling
began to prevail the enthusiasm quickly evaporated, and efforts were
made to dissuade Cosmo and De Beauxchamps from making the attempt. But
they were deaf to all remonstrance, and pushing out of the chattering
crowd, Cosmo ordered the gangway about the bell to be cleared of all
bystanders. The opposition heated his blood a little, and he began to
bear himself with an air which recalled his aspect when he quelled and
punished the mutiny. This was enough to silence instantly every objector
to his proceedings. Henceforth they kept their thoughts to themselves,
although some muttered, under their breath such epithets as "fool" and
"harebrain."

In about half an hour after Cosmo's speech the bell, with its hardy
explorers safely inclosed within, was lowered away, and a minute later
hundreds were craning their necks over the rails to watch the shining
globe engulf itself swiftly in the sapphire depths. It was about nine
o'clock in the morning when the descent was begun, and for a long time,
so remarkable was the transparency of the water, they could see the bell
sinking, and becoming smaller until it resembled a blue pearl. Sometimes
a metallic flash shot from its polished sides like a gleam of violet
lightning. But at length it passed from view, swallowed up in the
tremendous watery chasm.

We turn now to trace the adventures of the bell and its inmates as they
entered the awful twilight of the ocean, and, sinking deeper, passed
gradually into a profundity which the sun's most powerful rays were
unable to penetrate. Fortunately every one of the adventurers left a
description of his experiences and sensations, so that there is no lack
of authentic information to guide us.

The windows, as Cosmo had said, were so arranged that they afforded
views on all sides. These views were, of course, restricted by the
combined effects of the smallness of the windows and their great
thickness; the inmates were somewhat like prisoners looking out of round
ports cut through massive walls, but the range of view was much widened
when they placed themselves close to the glasses, because the latter
were in the form of truncated cones with the base outward.

Glancing through the ports on the upper side of the bell Cosmo and his
companions could perceive the huge form of the Ark, hanging like a cloud
above them, but rapidly receding, while from the side ports they saw
great shafts of azure sunlight, thrown into wonderful undulations by the
disturbance of the water. These soon became fainter and gradually
disappeared, but before the gloom of the depths settled about them they
were thrilled by the spectacle of sharks and other huge fishes nosing
about the outer side of the transparent cones, and sometimes opening
their jaws as if trying to seize them. Most of the cone-shaped windows
had flat surfaces, but a few were of spherical outline both without and
within, and the radius of curvature had been so calculated that these
particular windows served as huge magnifying lenses for an eye placed at
a given distance. Once or twice a marine monster happened to place
himself in the field of one of these magnifying windows, startling the
observers almost out of their senses with his frightful appearance.

There were also four windows reserved for projecting a searchlight into
the outer darkness. The inner side of the bell corresponded in curvature
with the outer, so that the adventurers had no flat flooring on any side
to stand upon, but this caused little inconvenience, since the walls
were abundantly provided with hand and foot holds, enabling the inmates
to maintain themselves in almost any position they could wish.

After a while they passed below the range of daylight, and then they
turned on the searchlight. The storage batteries which supplied energy
for the searchlight and the propellers served also to operate an
apparatus for clearing the air of carbonic acid, and De Beauxchamps had
carefully calculated the limit of time that the air could be kept in a
breathable condition. This did not exceed forty-eight hours--but as we
have seen they had no intention of remaining under water longer than
twenty hours at the utmost.

When the bell entered the night of the sea-depths they passed into an
apparently lifeless zone, where the searchlight, projected now on one
side and now on another, revealed no more of the living forms which they
had encountered above, but showed only a desert of solid transparent
water. Here, amid this awful isolation, they experienced for the first
time a feeling of dread and terror. An overpowering sense of loneliness
and helplessness came over them, and only the stout heart of Cosmo
Versál, and his reassuring words, kept the others from making the signal
which would have caused the bell to be hastily drawn back to the Ark.

"M. De Beauxchamps," said Cosmo, breaking the impressive silence, "to
what depth have we now descended?"

"A thousand fathoms," replied the Frenchman, consulting his automatic
register.

"Good! We have been only thirty minutes in reaching this depth. We shall
sink more slowly as we get deeper, but I think we can count upon
reaching the bottom in not more than four hours from the moment of our
departure. It will require only two hours for them to draw us back again
with the powerful engines of the Ark, especially when aided by our
propellers. This will leave fourteen hours for our explorations, if we
stay out the limit that we have fixed."

There was such an air of confidence in Cosmo's manner and words that
this simple statement did much to enhearten the others.

"The absence of life in this part of the sea," Cosmo continued
cheerfully, "does not surprise me. It has long been known that the life
of the ocean is confined to regions near the surface and the bottom. We
shall certainly find plenty of wonderful creatures below."

When they knew that they must be near the bottom they turned the light
downward, and every available window was occupied by an eager watcher.
Presently a cry of "Look! Look there!" broke from several voices at
once.

The searchlight, penetrating far through the clear water beneath the
bell, fell in a circle round a most remarkable object--tall, gaunt, and
spectral, with huge black ribs.

"Why, it's the Metropolitan tower, still standing!" cried Amos Blank.
"Who would have believed it possible?"

"No doubt there was some lucky circumstance about its anchorage,"
returned Cosmo. "Although it was built so long ago, it was made
immensely strong, and well braced, and as the water did not undermine it
at the start, it has been favored by the very density of that which now
surrounds it, and which tends to buoy it up and hold it steady. But you
observe that it has been stripped of the covering of stone."

"Would it not be well to utilize it for anchoring the cable?" asked De
Beauxchamps.

"We could have nothing better," said Cosmo.

De Beauxchamps immediately called to the Ark, and directed the movements
of those in charge of the drum of the cable so nicely that the descent
ceased at the exact moment when the bell came to rest upon a group of
beams at the top of the tower. The radio-control, which is so familiar
in its thousand applications to-day, was then a new thing, having been
invented only a year or so before the deluge, and De Beauxchamps's form
of the apparatus was crude. The underlying principle, however, was the
same as that now employed--transmission through a metallic wall of
impulses capable of being turned into mechanic energy. With its aid they
had no difficulty in detaching the cable from the bell, but it required
some careful maneuvering to secure a satisfactory attachment to the
beams of the tower. At last, however, this was effected, and immediately
they set out for their exploration of drowned New York.

They began with the skeleton tower itself, which had only once or twice
been exceeded in height by the famous structures of the era of
skyscrapers. In some places they found the granite skin yet _in situ_,
but almost everywhere it had been stripped off, probably by the
tremendous waves which swept over it as the flood attained its first
thousand feet of elevation. They saw no living forms, except a few
curiously shaped phosphorescent creatures of no great size, which
scurried away out of the beam of the search-light. They saw no trace of
the millions of their fellow-beings who had been swallowed up in this
vast grave, and for this all secretly gave thanks. The soil of Madison
Square had evidently been washed away, for no signs of the trees which
had once shaded it were seen, and a reddish ooze had begun to collect
upon the exposed rocks. All around were the shattered ruins of other
great buildings, some, like the Metropolitan tower, yet retaining their
steel skeletons, others tumbled down, and lying half-buried in the ooze.

Finding nothing of great interest in this neighborhood they turned the
course of the bell northward, passing everywhere over interminable
ruins, and as soon as they began to skirt the ridge of Morningside
Heights the huge form of the cathedral of St. John fell within the
circle of projected light. It was unroofed, and some of the walls had
fallen, but some of the immense arches yet retained their upright
position. Here, for the first time, they encountered the real giants of
the submarine depths. De Beauxchamps, who had seen some of these
creatures during his visit to Paris in the _Jules Verne_, declared that
nothing which he had seen there was so terrifying as what they now
beheld. One creature, which seemed to be the unresisted master of this
kingdom of phosphorescent life, appears to have exceeded in strangeness
the utmost descriptive powers of all those who looked upon it, for their
written accounts are filled with ejaculations, and are more or less
inconsistent with one another. The reader gathers from them, however,
the general impression that it made upon their astonished minds.

The creatures were of a livid hue, and had the form of a globe, as large
as the bell itself, with a valvular opening on one side which was
evidently a mouth, surrounded with a circle of eyelike disks, projecting
shafts of self-evolved light into the water. They moved about with
surprising ease, rising and sinking at will, sometimes rolling along the
curve of an arch, emitting flashes of green fire, and occasionally
darting across the intervening spaces in pursuit of their prey, which
consisted of smaller prosphorescent animals that fled in the utmost
consternation. When the adventurers in the bell saw one of the globular
monsters seize its victim they were filled with horror. It had driven
its prey into a corner of the wrecked choir, and suddenly it flattened
itself like a rubber bulb pressed against the wall, completely covering
the creature that was to be devoured, although the effect of its
struggles could be perceived; and then, to the amazement of the
onlookers, the living globe slowly turned itself inside out, engulfing
the victim in the process.

"Great heavens," exclaimed Professor Abel Able, "it is a gigantic
_hydroid polyps!_ That is precisely the way in which those little
creatures swallow their prey; outside becomes inside, what was the
surface of the body is turned into the lining of the digestive cavity,
and every time they take a meal the process of introversion is repeated.
This monster is nothing but a huge self-sustaining maw!"

"_Trčs bien_," exclaimed De Beauxchamps, with a slight laugh, "and he
finds himself in New York, quite _chez soi_."

Nobody appeared to notice the sarcasm, and, in any case they would
quickly have forgotten it, for no sooner had the tragic spectacle which
they had witnessed been finished than they suddenly found the bell
surrounded by a crowd of the globe-shaped creatures, jostling one
another, and flattening themselves against its metallic walls. They
pushed the bell about, rolling themselves all over it, and apparently
finding nothing terrifying in the searchlight, which was hardly brighter
than the phosphorescent gleams which shot from their own luminescent
organs. One of them got one of its luminous disks exactly in the field
of a magnifying window, and King Richard, who happened to have his eye
in the focus, started back with a cry of alarm.

"I cannot describe what I saw," the king wrote in his notebook. "It was
a glimpse of fiery cones, triangles, and circles, ranged in tier behind
tier with a piercing eye in the center, and the light that came from
them resembled nothing that I have ever seen. It seemed to be a _living
emanation_, and almost paralyzed me."

"We must get away from them," cried De Beauxchamps, as soon as the first
overwhelming effect of the attack upon the bell had passed. And
immediately he set the propellers at their highest speed.

The bell shook and half rolled over, there was a scurrying among the
monsters outside, and two or three of them floated away partly in
collapse, as if they had been seriously wounded by the short propeller
blades.

The direction of flight chanced to carry them past the dome of the
Columbia University Library, which was standing almost intact, and then
they floated near the monumental tomb of General Grant, which had
crowned a noble elevation overlooking the Hudson River. A portion of the
upper part of this structure had been carried away, but the larger part
remained in position. They saw no more of the globular creatures which
had haunted the ruins of the cathedral, but, instead, there appeared
around the bell an immense multitude of small luminescent animals, many
of them most beautifully formed, and emitting from their light-producing
organs various exquisite colors which turned the surrounding water into
an all-embracing rainbow.

[Illustration: "AND THEN THEY FLOATED NEAR THE MONUMENTAL TOMB OF
GENERAL GRANT"]

But a more marvelous phenomenon quickly made its appearance, causing
them to gasp with astonishment. As they drew near the dismantled dome a
brilliant gleam suddenly streamed into the ports on the side turned
toward the monument--a gush of light so bright that the air inside the
bell seemed to have been illuminated with a golden sunrise. They glanced
toward the monument, and saw that it was surmounted by some vibrating
object which seemed instinct with blinding fire. The colors that sprang
from it changed rapidly from gold to purple, and then, through
shimmering hues of bronze, to a deep rich orange. It looked like a sun,
poised on the horizon. The spectacle was so dazzling, so unexpected, so
beautiful, and, associated with the architectural memorial of one of the
greatest characters in American history, so strangely suggestive, that
even King Richard and the two Frenchmen were strongly moved, while Cosmo
and his fellow-countrymen grasped each other by the hand, and the former
said, in solemn tones:

"My friends, to my mind, this scene, however accidental, has something
of prophecy about it. It changes the current of my thought--America is
not dead; in some way she yet survives upon the earth."

Long they gazed and wondered, but at last, partly recovering from their
astonishment, at the suggestion of De Beauxchamps, they drew nearer the
monument. But when they had arrived within a few yards of it, the
blinding light disappeared as if snuffed out, and they saw nothing but
the broken gray walls of the dome. The moving object, which had been
dimly visible at the beginning, and had evidently been the source of the
light, had vanished.

"The creature that produced the illumination," said Professor Abel Able,
"has been alarmed by our approach, and has withdrawn into the interior."

This was, no doubt, the true explanation, but they could perceive no
signs of life about the place, and they finally turned away from it with
strange sensations.

Avoiding the neighborhood of the cathedral, they steered the bell down
the former course of the Hudson, but afterward ventured once more over
the drowned city until they arrived at the site of the great station of
the Pennsylvania Railroad, which they found completely unroofed. They
sank the bell into the vast space where the tunnels entered from
underneath the old river bed, and again they had a startling experience.
Something huge, elongated, and spotted, and provided with expanding
claw-like limbs, slowly withdrew as their light streamed upon the
reddish ooze covering the great floor. The nondescript retreated
backward into the mouth of a tunnel. They endeavored, cautiously, to
follow it, turning a magnifying window in its direction, and obtaining a
startling view of glaring eyes, but the creature hastened its retreat,
and the last glimpse they had was of a grotesque head, which threw out
piercing rays of green fire as it passed deeper into the tunnel.

"This is too terrible," exclaimed King Richard, shuddering. "In Heaven's
name, let us go no farther."

"We must visit Wall Street," said Amos Blank. "We must see what the
former financial center of the world now looks like."

Accordingly they issued from the ruined station, and, resuming their
course southward, arrived at length over the great money center. The
tall buildings which had shouldered each other in that wonderful
district, turning the streets into immense gorges, had, to a certain
extent, protected one another against the effects of the waves, and the
skeletons of many were yet standing. In the midst of them the dark spire
of old Trinity still pointed stoutly upward, as if continuing its
hopeless struggle against the spirit of worldly grandeur whose aspiring
creations, though in ruins, yet dwarfed this symbol of immortality. At
the intersection of the Wall and Broad Street cańons they found an
enormous steel edifice, which had been completed a short time before the
deluge, tumbled in ruins upon the classic form of the old Stock
Exchange, the main features of whose front were yet recognizable. The
weight of the fallen building had been so great that it had crushed the
roof of the treasure vaults which had occupied its ground floor, and the
fragments of safes with their contents had been hurled over the northern
expanse of Broad Street. The red ooze had covered most of the wasted
wealth there heaped up, but in places piles of gold showed through the
covering. Amos Blank became greatly excited at this. His old
proclivities seemed to resume their sway and his former madness to
return, and he buried his finger nails in his clenched palms as he
pressed his face against a window, exclaiming:

"_My gold!_ MY GOLD! Let me out of this! I must have it!"

"Nobody can get out of the bell, Mr. Blank," said Cosmo soothingly. "And
the gold is now of no use to anybody."

"I tell you," cried Blank, "that that is _my_ gold. It comes from _my_
vaults, and I _must_ get out!" And he dashed his fists wildly against
the glass until his knuckles were covered with blood. Then he sought
about for some implement with which to break the glass. They were
compelled to seize him, and a dreadful struggle followed in the
restricted space within the bell. In the midst of it Blank's face became
set, and his eyes stared wildly out of a window.

The others followed the direction of his gaze, and they were almost
frozen into statues. Close beside the bell, which had, during the
struggle, floated near to the principal heap of mingled treasure and
ruin, heavily squatted on the very summit of the pile, was such a
creature as no words could depict--of a ghastly color, bulky and
malformed, furnished with three burning eyes that turned now green, now
red with lambent flame, and great shapeless limbs, which it uplifted one
after the other, striking awkward, pawing blows at the bell! It seemed
to the horrified onlookers to be the very demon of greed defending its
spoil. Blank sank helpless on the bottom side of the bell, and the
others remained for a time petrified, and unable to speak. Suddenly the
dreadful creature, making a forward lunge from its perch, struck the
bell a mighty blow that sent it spinning in a partly upward direction.
The inmates were tumbled over one another, bruised and cut by the
projections that served for hand and foot holds. So great had been the
impact of the blow that the bell continued to revolve for several
minutes, and they could do nothing to help themselves, except to seize
the holds as they came within their grasp, and hang on for dear life.
The violent shaking up roused Blank from his trance, and he hung on
desperately with the others.

After a while the bell ceased to spin, and began to sink again toward
the bottom. De Beauxchamps, who had recovered some degree of
self-command, instantly began to operate the control governing the
propellers, and in a few minutes he had the bell moving in a fixed
direction.

"This way, this way," cried Cosmo, glancing out of the windows to orient
himself. "We have seen enough! We must get back to the cable, and return
to the Ark!"

They were terror-stricken now, and pushing the propellers to their
utmost, they fled toward the site of the Metropolitan tower. On their
way, although for a time they passed over the course of the East River,
they saw no signs of the great bridges except the partly demolished but
yet beautiful towers of the oldest of them, which had been constructed
of heavy granite blocks. They found the cable attached as they had left
it, and, although they were yet nervous from their recent experience,
they had no great difficulty in re-attaching it to the bell. Then, with
a sigh of relief, they signaled, and shouted through the telephone to
the Ark.

But no answer came, and there was no responsive movement of the cable!
They signaled and called again, but without result.

"My God!" said Cosmo, in a faltering voice. "Can anything have happened
to the cable?"

They looked at each other with blanched cheeks, and no man found a word
to reply.




CHAPTER XXVI

NEW AMERICA


There had been great excitement on the Ark when the first communication
from the bell was received, announcing the arrival of the adventurers at
the Metropolitan tower. The news spread everywhere in a few seconds, and
the man in charge of the signaling apparatus and telephone would have
been mobbed if Captain Arms had not rigorously shut off all
communication with him, compelling the eager inquirers to be content
with such information as he himself saw fit to give them. When the
announcement was made that the bell had been cut loose, and the
exploration begun, the excitement was intensified, and a Babel of voices
resounded all over the great ship.

As hour after hour passed with no further communication from below the
anxiety of the multitude became almost unbearable. Some declared that
the adventurers would never be able to re-attach the bell to the cable,
and the fear rapidly spread that they would never be seen again. Captain
Arms strove in vain to reassure the excited passengers, but they grew
every moment more demoralized, and he was nearly driven out of his
senses by the insistent questioning to which he was subjected. It was
almost a relief to him when the lookout announced an impending change of
weather--although he well new the peril which such a change might bring.

It came on more rapidly than anybody could have anticipated. The sky, in
the middle of the afternoon, became clouded, the sun was quickly hidden,
and a cold blast arose, quickly strengthening into a regular blow. The
Ark began to drift as the rising waves assailed its vast flanks.

"Pay out the cable!" roared Captain Arms through his trumpet.

If he had not been instantly obeyed it is probable that the cable would
have been dragged from its precarious fastening below. Then he instantly
set the engines at work, and strove to turn the Ark so as to keep it
near the point of descent. At first they succeeded very well, but the
captain knew that the wind was swiftly increasing in force, and that he
could not long continue to hold his place. It was a terrible emergency,
but he proved himself equal to it.

"We must float the cable," he shouted to his first assistant. "Over with
the big buoy."

This buoy of levium had been prepared for other possible emergencies. It
was flat, presenting little surface to the wind, and when, working with
feverish speed, aided by an electric launch, they had attached the cable
to it, it sank so low that its place on the sea was indicated only by
the short mast, capped with a streamer, which rose above it.

When this work was completed a sigh of relief whistled through Captain
Arms's huge whiskers.

"May Davy Jones hold that cable tight!" he exclaimed. "Now for
navigating the Ark. If I had my old _Maria Jane_ under my feet I'd defy
Boreas himself to blow me away from here--but this whale!"

The wind increased fast, and in spite of every effort the Ark was driven
farther and farther toward the southwest, until the captain's telescope
no longer showed the least glimpse of the streamer on the buoy. Then
night came on, and yet the wind continued to blow. The captain compelled
all the passengers to go to their rooms. It would be useless to
undertake to describe the terror and despair of that night. When the sun
rose again the captain found that they had been driven seventy-five
miles from the site of New York, and yet, although the sky had now
partly cleared, the violence of the wind had not diminished.

Captain Arms had the passengers' breakfast served in their rooms, simply
sending them word that all would be well in the end. But in his secret
heart he doubted if he could find the buoy again. He feared that it
would be torn loose with the cable.

About noon the wind lulled, and at last the Ark could be effectively
driven in the direction of the buoy. But their progress was slow, and
night came on once more. During the hours of darkness the wind ceased
entirely, and the sea became calm. With the sunrise the search for the
buoy was begun in earnest. The passengers were now allowed to go upon
some of the decks, and to assemble in the grand saloon, but no
interference was permitted with the navigators of the Ark. Never had
Captain Arms so fully exhibited his qualities as a seaman.

"We'll find that porpoise if it's still afloat," he declared.

About half after eight o'clock a cry ran through the ship, bringing
everybody out on the decks.

The captain had discovered the buoy through his glass!

It lay away to the nor'ard, about a mile, and as they approached all
could see the streamer, hanging down its pole, a red streak in the
sunshine.

"Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!" The Ark echoed with glad cries from stem to
stern. A thousand questions were shouted at the captain on his bridge,
but he was imperturbable. He only glanced at his watch, and then said,
in an undertone, to Joseph Smith, who stood beside him:

"Forty-seven hours and twenty minutes. By the time we can get the cable
back on the drum it will be full forty-eight hours since they started,
and the air in the bell could be kept in condition no longer than that.
It may take as much as two hours more to draw it up."

"Can you do it so rapidly as that?" asked Smith, his voice trembling.

"I'll do it or bust," returned the captain. "Perhaps they may yet be
alive."

Smith turned his eyes upward and clasped his hands. The Ark was put to
its utmost speed, and within the time estimated by the captain the cable
was once more on the great drum. Before starting it the captain attached
the telephone and shouted down. There was no reply.

"Start gently, and then, if she draws, drive for your lubberly lives,"
he said to the men in charge of the big donkey engine.

The moment it began to turn he inspected the indicator.

"Hurrah!" he exclaimed. "She pulls; the bell is attached."

The crowded decks broke into a cheer. In a few minutes the Ark was
vibrating with the strokes of the engine. Within five minutes the
strong, slender cable was issuing out of the depths at the rate of 250
feet a minute. But there were six miles of it! The engineer controlling
the drum shook his head.

"We may break the cable," he said.

"Go on!" shouted Captain Arms. "It's their only chance. Every second of
delay means sure death."

Within forty minutes the cable was coming up 300 feet a minute. The
speed increased as the bell rose out of the depths. It was just one hour
and forty-five minutes after the drum began to revolve when the anxious
watchers were thrown into a furore of excitement by the appearance of a
shining blue point deep beneath. It was the bell! Again there broke
forth a tempest of cheers.

Rapidly the rising bell grew larger under their eyes, until at last it
burst the surface of the sea. The engine had been skillfully slowed at
the last moment, and the rescued bell stopped at the level of the deck
open to receive it. With mad haste it was drawn aboard and the hermetic
door was opened. Those who were near enough glanced inside and turned
pale. Tumbled in a heap at the bottom lay the six men, with yellow faces
and blank, staring eyes. In an instant they were lifted out and two
doctors sprang to the side of each. Were they dead? Could any skill
revive them? A hush as of death spread over the great vessel.

They were not dead. The skill of the physicians brought them, one after
another, slowly back to consciousness. But it was two full days before
they could rise from their beds, and three before they could begin to
tell their story--the story of the wonders they had seen, and of the
dreadful struggle for breath in the imprisoned bell before they had sunk
into unconsciousness. Not a word was ever spoken about the strange
outbreak of Blank at the sight of the gold, although the others all
recorded it in their notebooks. He himself never referred to it, and it
seemed to have faded from his mind.

As soon as it was evident that the rescued men would recover, Captain
Arms, acting on his own responsibility, had started the Ark on its
westward course. It was a long and tedious journey that they had yet
before them, but the monotony was broken by the undying interest in the
marvelous story of the adventures of the bell.

Three weeks after they left the vicinity of New York, the observations
showed that they must be nearing the eastern border of the Colorado
plateau. Then one day a bird alighted on the railing of the bridge,
close beside Cosmo and Captain Arms.

"A bird!" cried Cosmo. "But it is incredible that a bird should be here!
How can it ever have kept itself afloat? It surely could not have
remained in the air all this time, and it could not have rested on the
waves during the downpour from the sky! Its presence here is absolutely
miraculous!"

The poor bird, evidently exhausted by a long journey, remained upon the
rail, and permitted Cosmo to approach closely before taking flight to
another part of the Ark. Cosmo at first thought that it might have
escaped from his aviary below.

But close inspection satisfied him that it was of a different species
from any that he had taken into the Ark, and the more he thought of the
strangeness of its appearance here the greater was his bewilderment.

While he was puzzling over the subject the bird was seen by many of the
passengers, flitting from one part of the vessel to another, and they
were as much astonished as Cosmo had been, and all sorts of conjectures
were made to account for the little creature's escape from the flood.

But within an hour or two Cosmo and the captain, who were now much
oftener alone upon the bridge than they had been during their passage
over the eastern continents, had another, and an incomparably greater,
surprise.

It was the call of "Land, ho!" from the lookout.

"Land!" exclaimed Cosmo. "Land! How can there be any land?"

Captain Arms was no less incredulous, and he called the lookout down,
accused him of having mistaken a sleeping whale for a landfall, and sent
another man aloft in his place. But in a few minutes the same call of
"Land, ho!" was repeated.

The captain got the bearings of the mysterious object this time, and the
Ark was sent for it at her highest speed. It rose steadily out of the
water until there could be no possibility of not recognizing it as the
top of a mountain.

When it had risen still higher, until its form seemed gigantic against
the horizon, Captain Arms, throwing away his tobacco with an emphatic
gesture, and striking his palm on the rail, fairly shouted:

"The Pike! By--the old Pike! There she blows!"

"Do you mean Pike's Peak?" demanded Cosmo.

"Do I mean Pike's Peak?" cried the captain, whose excitement had become
uncontrollable. "Yes, I mean Pike's Peak, and the deuce to him! Wasn't I
born at his foot? Didn't I play ball in the Garden of the Gods? And look
at him, Mr. Versál! There he stands! No water-squirting pirate of a
nebula could down the old Pike!"

The excitement of everybody else was almost equal to the captain's, when
the grand mass of the mountain, with its characteristic profile, came
into view from the promenade-decks.

De Beauxchamps, King Richard, and Amos Blank hurried to the bridge,
which they were still privileged to invade, and the two former in
particular asked questions faster than they could be answered.
Meanwhile, they were swiftly approaching the mountain.

King Richard seemed to be under the impression that they had completed
the circuit of the world ahead of time, and his first remark was to the
effect that Mount Everest appeared to be rising faster than they had
anticipated.

"That's none of your pagodas!" exclaimed the captain disdainfully;
"that's old Pike; and if you can find a better crown for the world, I'd
like to see it."

The king looked puzzled, and Cosmo explained that they were still near
the center of the American continent, and that the great peak before
them was the sentinel of the Rocky Mountains.

"But," replied the king, "I understood you that the whole world was
covered, and that the Himalayas would be the first to emerge."

"That's what I believed," said Cosmo, "but the facts are against me."

"So you thought you were going to run over the Rockies!" exclaimed the
captain gleefully. "They're no Gaurisankars, hey, M. De Beauxchamps?"

"_Vive les Rockies! Vive le Pike!_" cried the Frenchman, catching the
captain's enthusiasm.

"But how do you explain it?" asked King Richard.

"It's the batholite," responded Cosmo, using exactly the same phrase
that Professor Pludder had employed some months before.

"And pray explain to me what is a batholite?"

Before Cosmo Versál could reply there was a terrific crash, and the Ark,
for the third time in her brief career, had made an unexpected landing.
But this time the accident was disastrous.

All on the bridge, including Captain Arms, who should surely have known
the lay of the land about his childhood's home, had been so interested
in their talk that before they were aware of the danger the great vessel
had run her nose upon a projecting buttress of the mountain.

She was going at full speed, too. Not a person aboard but was thrown
from his feet, and several were severely injured.

The prow of the Ark was driven high upon a sloping surface of rock, and
the tearing sounds showed only too clearly that this time both bottoms
had been penetrated, and that there could be no hope of saving the huge
ship or getting her off.

Perhaps at no time in all their adventures had the passengers of the Ark
been so completely terrorized and demoralized, and many members of the
crew were in no better state. Cosmo and the captain shouted orders, and
ran down into the hold to see the extent of the damage. Water was
pouring in through the big rents in torrents.

There was plainly nothing to be done but to get everybody out of the
vessel and upon the rocks as rapidly as possible.

The forward parts of the promenade-deck directly overhung the rock upon
which the Ark had forced itself, and it was possible for many to be let
down that way. At the same time boats were set afloat, and dozens got
ashore in them.

While everybody was thus occupied with things immediately concerning
their safety, nobody paid any attention to the approach of a boat, which
had set out from a kind of bight in the face of the mountain.

Cosmo was at the head of the accommodation-ladder that was being let
down on the starboard side, when he heard a shout, and, lifting his eyes
from his work, was startled to see a boat containing, beside the rowers,
two men whom he instantly recognized--they were President Samson and
Professor Pludder.

Their sudden appearance here astonished him as much as that of Pike's
Peak itself had done. He dropped his hands and stared at them as their
boat swiftly approached. The ladder had just been got ready, and the
moment the boat touched its foot Professor Pludder mounted to the deck
of the Ark as rapidly as his great weight would permit.

He stretched out his hand as his foot met the deck, and smilingly said:

"Versál, you were right about the nebula."

"Pludder," responded Cosmo, immediately recovering his aplomb, and
taking the extended hand of the professor, "you certainly know the truth
when you see it."

Not another word was exchanged between them for the time, and Professor
Pludder instantly set to work aiding the passengers to descend the
ladder. Cosmo waved his hand in greeting to the President, who remained
in the boat, and politely lifted his tall, but sadly battered hat in
response.

The Ark had become so firmly lodged that, after the passengers had all
got ashore, Cosmo decided to open a way through the forward end of the
vessel by removing some of the plates, so that the animals could be
taken ashore direct from their deck by simply descending a slightly
sloping gangway.

This was a work that required a whole day, and while it was going
forward under Cosmo's directions the passengers, and such of the crew as
were not needed, found their way, led by the professor and the
President, round a bluff into a kind of mountain lap, where they were
astonished to see many rough cottages, situated picturesquely among the
rocks, and small cultivated spaces, with grass and flowers, surrounding
them.

Here dwelt some hundreds of people, who received the shipwrecked company
with Western hospitality, after the first effects of their astonishment
had worn off. It appears that, owing to its concealment by a projecting
part of the mountain, the Ark had not been seen until just at the moment
when it went ashore.

Although it was now the early part of September, the air was warm and
balmy, and barn-yard fowls were clucking and scratching about the rather
meager soil around the houses and outbuildings.

There was not room in this place for all the newcomers, but Professor
Pludder assured them that in many of the neighboring hollows, which had
formerly been mountain gorges, there were similar settlements, and that
room would be found for all.

Parties were sent off under the lead of guides, and great was the
amazement, and, it may be added, joy, with which they were received in
the little communities that clustered about the flanks of the mountain.

About half of Cosmo's animals had perished, most of them during the
terrible experiences attending the arrival of the nucleus, which have
already been described, but those that remained were in fairly good
condition, and with the possible exception of the elephants, they seemed
glad to feel solid ground once more under their feet.

The elephants had considerable difficulty in making their way over the
rocks to the little village, but finally all were got to a place of
security. The great Californian cattle caused hardly less trouble than
the elephants, but the Astorian turtles appeared to feel themselves at
home at once.

Cosmo, with King Richard, De Beauxchamps, Amos Blank, Captain Arms, and
Joseph Smith, became the guests of Professor Pludder and the President
in their modest dwellings, and as soon as a little order had been
established explanations began. Professor Pludder was the first
spokesman, the scene being the President's "parlor."

He told of their escape from Washington and of their arrival on the
Colorado plateau.

"When the storm recommenced," he said, "I recognized the complete truth
of your theory, Mr. Versál--I had partially recognized it before--and I
made every preparation for the emergency.

"The downfall, upon the whole, was not as severe here as it had been
during the earlier days of the deluge, but it must have been far more
severe elsewhere.

"The sea around us began to rise, and then suddenly the rise ceased.
After studying the matter I concluded that a batholite was rising under
this region, and that there was a chance that we might escape
submergence through its influence."

"Pardon me," interrupted King Richard, "but Mr. Versál has already
spoken of a 'batholite.' What does that mean?"

"I imagine," replied the professor, smiling, "that neither Mr. Versál
nor I have used the term in a strictly technical sense. At least we have
vastly extended and modified its meaning in order to meet the
circumstances of our case.

"Batholite is a word of the old geology, derived, from a language which
was once widely cultivated, Greek, and meaning, in substance, stone, or
rock, 'from the depths.'

"The conception underlying it is that of an immense mass of plastic rock
rising under the effects of pressure from the interior of the globe,
forcing, and in part melting its way to the surface, or lifting up the
superincumbent crust.

"Geologists had discovered the existence of many great batholites that
had risen in former ages, and there were some gigantic ones known in
this part of America."

"That," interposed Cosmo, "was the basis of my idea that the continents
would rise again, only I supposed that the rise would first manifest
itself in the Himalayan region.

"However, since it has resulted in the saving of so many lives here, I
cannot say that my disappointment goes beyond the natural mortification
of a man of science upon discovering that he has been in error."

"I believe," said Professor Pludder, "that at least a million have
survived here in the heart of the continent through the uprising of the
crust. We have made explorations in many directions, and have found that
through all the Coloradan region people have succeeded in escaping to
the heights.

"Since the water, although it began to rise again after the first arrest
of the advance of the sea, never attained a greater elevation than about
7,500 feet as measured from the old sea-level contours, there must be
millions of acres, not to say square miles, that are still habitable.

"I even hope that the uprising has extended far through the Rocky
Mountain region."

Professor Pludder then went on to tell how they had escaped from the
neighborhood of Colorado Springs when the readvance of the sea began,
and how at last it became evident that the influence of the underlying
"batholite" would save them from submergence.

In some places, he said, violent phenomena had been manifested, and
severe earthquakes had been felt, but upon the whole, he thought, not
many had perished through that cause.

As soon as some degree of confidence that they were, after all, to
escape the flood, had been established, they had begun to cultivate such
soil as they could find, and now, after months of fair weather, they had
become fairly established in their new homes.

When Cosmo, on his side, had told of the adventures of the Ark, and of
the disappearance of the crown of the world in Asia, and when De
Beauxchamps had entertained the wondering listeners with his account of
the submarine explorations of the _Jules Verne_ and the diving bell, the
company at last broke up.

From this point--the arrival of the Ark in Colorado, and its wreck on
Pike's Peak--the literature of our subject becomes abundant, but we
cannot pause to review it in detail.

The re-emergence of the Colorado mountain region continued slowly, and
without any disastrous convulsions, and the level of the water receded
year by year as the land rose, and the sea lost by evaporation into
space and by chemical absorption in the crust.

In some other parts of the Rockies, as Professor Pludder had
anticipated, an uprising had occurred, and it was finally estimated that
as many as three million persons survived the deluge.

It was not the selected band with which Cosmo Versál had intended to
regenerate mankind, but from the Ark he spread a leaven which had its
effect on the succeeding generations.

He taught his principles of eugenics, and implanted deep the germs of
science, in which he was greatly aided by Professor Pludder, and, as all
readers of this narrative know, we have every reason to believe that our
new world, although its population has not yet grown to ten millions, is
far superior, in every respect, to the old world that was drowned.

As the dry land spread wider extensive farms were developed, and for a
long time there was almost no other occupation than that of cultivating
the rich soil.

President Samson was, by unanimous vote, elected President of the
republic of New America, and King Richard became his Secretary of State,
an office, he declared, of which he was prouder than he had been of his
kingship, when the sound of the British drumbeat accompanied the sun
around the world.

Amos Blank, returning to his old methods, soon became the leading
farmer, buying out the others until the government sternly interfered
and compelled him to relinquish everything but five hundred acres of
ground.

But on this Blank developed a most surprising collection of domestic
animals, principally from the stocks that Cosmo had saved in the Ark.

The elephants died, and the Astorian turtles did not reproduce their
kind, but the gigantic turkeys and the big cattle and sheep did
exceedingly well, and many other varieties previously unknown were
gradually developed with the aid of Sir Wilfrid Athelstone, who found
every opportunity to apply his theories in practice.

Of Costaké Theriade, and the inter-atomic force, it is only necessary to
remind the reader that the marvelous mechanical powers which we possess
to-day, and which we draw directly from the hidden stores of the
electrons, trace their origin to the brain of the "speculative genius"
from Roumania, whom Cosmo Versál had the insight to save from the great
second deluge.

All of these actors long ago passed from the scene, President Samson
being the last survivor, after winning by his able administration the
title of the second father of his country. But to the last he showed his
magnanimity by honoring Cosmo Versál, and upon the latter's death he
caused to be carved, high on the brow of the great mountain on which his
voyage ended, in gigantic letters, cut deep in the living rock, and
covered with shining, incorrodible levium, an inscription that will
transmit his fame to the remotest posterity:

                HERE RESTED THE ARK OF
                    COSMO VERSAL!
  _He Foresaw and Prepared for the Second Deluge,
                  And Although Nature
             Aided Him in Unexpected Ways,
  Yet, but for Him, His Warnings, and His Example
          The World of Man Would Have Ceased
                     To Exist._


It would be unjust to Mr. Samson to suppose that any ironical intention
was in his mind when he composed this lofty inscription.


_Postscriptum_

While these words are being written, news comes of the return of an
aero, driven by inter-atomic energy, from a voyage of exploration round
the earth.

It appears that the Alps are yet deeply buried, but that Mount Everest
now lifts its head more than ten thousand feet above the sea, and that
some of the loftiest plains of Tibet are beginning to re-emerge.

Thus Cosmo Versál's prediction is fulfilled, though he has not lived to
see it.




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