If the unhappy mortal had been capable of thinking at the moment he was hurled from the car by the vampires, it is more than probable that his mind would have presented the picture of a terrible and instantaneous death. Strange to relate, instead of the rushing, headlong plunge downward, to be anticipated under the conditions, our hero found himself gently floating in space with the buoyancy of one of the feathered tribe. The dread and fear of death were lost, or rather swallowed up in a nameless terror, at the unnatural position in which he was placed. Yet there was no mystery in it. According to a well-known law, the weight of bodies diminishes as they descend from the outside of the Earth. It is at the surface of the globe where weight is most sensibly felt, and it is just possible that, had we accompanied the shepherd through the thick crust of the terrestrial sphere, we should have soon discovered, as he did, that beyond, at the other side, there is little or no gravity at all. Hence his peculiar position. Indeed, it was most fortunate that the old man chanced to have several nuggets of gold in his pockets at the time, otherwise, I’m afraid he would have been suspended in mid-air like Mohammed’s coffin. As it happened, gold turned the scale, even in Moonland, and enabled the adventurous mortal to descend in a horizontal rather than a vertical course to the shores of the Moon.
Within his vision below lay a vast expanse of water; the rugged coast bordered with majestic hills, torn by earthquakes, and blasted and ravaged by volcanic fires. The waves broke on this shore with a dull, hollow noise against the cliffs. Some of these, dividing the coast with their sharp spurs, formed capes and promontories, fantastic in form and worn by the ceaseless action of the surf. It was like a continuous cosmical phenomenon, filling a basin of sufficient extent to contain an inland sea, and walled by enormous mountains with the irregular shores of Earth, but desert, and fearfully wild.
If the eyes of the shepherd were able to range afar over this sea, it was because the shadowless light brought to view every detail of it. The expanse above him was a sky of huge plains of cloud, pale yellow in colour, and drifting with rapidity athwart the firmament, where appeared dark circles, rings and cones, in lieu of stars. Everything that he could liken to aught on this globe seemed changed by some potent power into opposite extremes. Downward, slowly but surely, without the faculty to change his course either to the right or to the left, the mortal at length plunged into the water. He was a capital swimmer, and had no fear of being drowned. Imagine his dismay, however, when he found himself sinking to the bottom like a crowbar, in spite of his vigorous efforts to keep afloat. In vain he struck out and struggled desperately to rise to the surface by use of legs and arms. Vain and useless. Down he went, plumbing the depths below, until he touched the bottom; then, to his surprise, he rebounded back again like a cork, but only to go down again as speedily as before.
The poor fellow had been pertinaciously holding his breath, as is customary when bathing in terrestrial streams; and therefore when he could no longer resist the unconquerable will of nature to draw breath, judge of the consternation which laid hold of him, when, instead of the choking gasp of suffocation anticipated, he found little difficulty in respiration! In fact, that vast sheet was not water at all, such as he knew it, but a subtle fluid, half way between a liquid and a gas, which, though heavier than air, was yet so much lighter than water that it was impossible for him to float in it.
These discoveries come to him in quick succession, and created within his mind the most unspeakable astonishment. By degrees, and after many attempts, he found that he could walk along the bed of this strange sea with comparative ease. Accordingly he straightway reached the shore and sat down on the cliffs to rest. Wonder upon wonder had crowded so fast and thick upon the bewildered mind of our traveller that his thoughts were in a whirl. Yet another surprise was in store for him, for as he extended his vision over the landscape he beheld a gigantic creature approaching with prodigious bounds and flying leaps. In his utter amazement he believed one of the rugged hills had been suddenly endowed with life, and was hurrying on to crush him. Never before had the eyes of breathing mortal rested on such a mammoth of human outline. No, nor upon anything with such power of movement. He was not certain whether the monster was leaping or flying, but he was quite positive as to its extraordinary swiftness.
“He was not certain whether the monster was leaping or flying.”
In his terror the shepherd fled—when lo! he found that he too was endowed with this singular force of locomotion. It is surprising how fear lends a man wings. The terrestrial one didn’t need anything of the kind, though. Incredible the springs and leaps he made over the high peaks, across chasms and cliffs, and along the steep mountain-sides; wonderful the feeling which changed from dread to exuberant delight and ecstasy, and again to terror, as the mighty voice of the pursuer came upon his ears like a peal of thunder.
“Halt! Stop! Who art thou?”
Had he been then and there endowed with wings, the old shepherd felt that he could not escape from the owner of that voice. All he could do was to cast himself flat on his face and await his doom in silence.
“Shall Greencheese utter his command twice? Who art thou?” repeated the mammoth.
“Mercy, your Highness. I am only old Bob, the shepherd of the Blue Mountains, New South Wales.”
“Old Bob! Blue Mountains! Ha! Fuddle-fum. Well?”
“Some fairies got hold of me t’other day, and bundles me down here, on a sort of humberellar, your Worship; that’s all I knows about it,” cried the mortal in a despairing tone.
“Fairies! Mum! I know the rogues,” responded the creature quickly. “Many a summer’s night I have watched their freaks and gambols among secluded nooks and dells hidden away from mortal ken. Many a long hour we have held converse together, in the silent ravines and woods, when all the human mites of the Australian world were locked in sleep. Go on!”
“I knows noffin’ more, sir, only that I shouldn’t like to leave my old body here!” cried Bob.
“Ha! Buncham! Fi-pho—fiddle-faddlem! Thou shalt live.”
“Thanks, your Highness.” And the shepherd lifted his eyes and gazed upon his companion. The Colossus at Rhodes, towering high above the lofty gables of the aged city, was but a pigmy in comparison. Ancient, hoary Sphinx of the Egyptians, standing for countless years on the shores of Father Nile, would have seemed a thing of yesterday beside it. Nay, that primitive marvel, the figure of wood discovered in Joppa, aged five thousand years, could reckon itself an infant in proximity to this lunarian.
Save the round, full, Chinese-like face, with its accompanying tremendous mouth, and the faint outline of the human form, there was nothing further to assist description of the creature except that he was high and bulky beyond conception, and quite as transparent as a lighted lantern. The face wasn’t at all unpleasant. It beamed with such a broad, friendly, yet withal humorous, expression as it gazed down upon Bob, that the mortal found courage to address it.
“Please, who be you, sir?”
“Me? I’m the Man in the Moon, of course,” replied the creature, smiling.
“Eh! Why, dash my old jumper, if I didn’t think as I’d seen your countenance before!” answered the old herdsman with animation. “I can tell yer, as ye comes out pretty strong sometimes on them ’ere mountains t’other side of Sydney. Why, I’ve yarded many a thousand sheep, and you’ve been a-looking at me all the while, eh?”
The Man in the Moon nodded.
“Ah, and I’ll bet you knows my old dog, Patch?”
Another nod in the affirmative.
“Brayvo! old boy. Why, we’re old chums. Shake hands.”
“We never shake hands in the Moon, Bob; but I’ll embrace you,” cried the lunarian, smiling; and suiting the action to the word, he suddenly enveloped the mortal in such a broad beam of refulgence that the old fellow appeared as if cased in polished armour.
In accordance with the etiquette of Moonland, it would be rude to disturb their tête-à-tête before next Saturday.