Audubon County journal. (Exira, Iowa) 1884-1993, 1909-02-25
CRUISE OF HE
''AL-lCE WALL

| Doken, bearing the mails mighty
cheer ascended with her. There were
no passengers except two super
numeraries shipped to fill the places
of any sailors who should inadvert-
emily desert while leaning over the
rail. kabhau, the noted aeronaut, was
in command, but Prof. Thayer had
been commissioned by a western uni
versity to observe, in the interest of
science, the PSYCHOLOGICAL effect of
high attitudes upon sea urchins-or
the glass vessel containing them.
AS the ship rapidly gained elevation,
| though ii seemed not to make much
horizontal progress, the crew became
alarmed at Il rumor that Kabhau had
forgotten which way to turn the things
that kept her from going too high. She
was said to be manageable, and in
that case would so up, up, intermin-
ably; nothing would induce her to turn
her nose toward the now-distant Meth
erness. Utter panic, alone, deferred
the crew from instant mutiny
Ten hours out the barometer turned
upside down and tried to work that
way. The mercury fell, and summer
clothing became mere mosquito net
Eting, became spider web, cut decollete,
cut peek-a-boo, dwindled into puerile
inadequacy.
The two substitute sailors, SILVER
ing at the taffrail, passed downward
through the rent in the clouds made
by the ships passage, and grumbled
The colossal mistake was dimly Wis
ible, though diminished by distance to
a petty faux pas,
"'Tis a pitiful cinder from the devils
own furnace Tim remarked; but
there's nothing want so much as TO
be upon that cinder"
| "True for ye,o Mike rejoined. otis
no more than three ions of rarefied
radioacttvity energetically diluted wild
a pint of rectiffed ether; but I'd give a
quarter or-it Why didn't they tie a
stirring TO it, so whin we wanted it We
could trawl it up?"
Il was thinking of me fireside," said
Tim, and want to go home. I've got
cold feet, a condition superinduced be
the state of the atmosphere, with ref
erince to its relative temperature All
me life I've wanted a sled that would
slide up hill. but It's glad | am | niver
had wan. What is life anyhow? A
mere misstep into trap-shooting ma
chine and up ye go down to Absolute
Zero, Sure, this trip makes me wish
I'd met wild fatal Illness when me
grandmother was a baby"
"Yis," walled Tim; i don't expect
to live to tell the folks AT home of me
sad death in mid-air On the ship that
nlNer returned, ana III thinking II
write q farewell letther.
"Ah.' said the professor speaking
OF letters reminds me that we mus
t drop the mails, to be forwarded b.
rail to Hoboken, as We are not makins
any progress in that direction.
rs Hoboken in Mars?' Mike in
quired.
, No its 1000 miles out, from sno
homish. York state they call it, o.
Jersey; but the mails are important.
: Ihe professor procured cork an'
dropped II overheard. II foated slowl'
downward,
GraVlVy Is sun WORKING, he oh
served.
: f5edad' INN. us Worklng back
WARD, sa4d Nike we re falilnS up.
haohau ana the mall clerk DrouSh
q gu, liie pouches, ana ine lorlhe
t iooNeu W." Matu 'iiIouSh P"lf "
Dihoe''ials. ne GERS nS.u d PouNl
49,, =. 20 ~ ,''o' -
- 7si"'4S - "
y 20.
10 ioiiie siiol II tiieN NJ IT,
iii,'t i'teieu'
Pe.ole YOU utol tiie mats s"s
ses'eu lioi. ii.@aei, sllouiu ilhe
lo'N 'i,lo.sl' ne Si'as' w iNa2iia'
wy teeiiliiVal tialhlils may ehaple ~
~ 'e'l you eAace!s OF apptoNilia.el
Miieie iioooheh SiIo't!" - Win let'
'ioi' " our own post'ioA' u we ai
}, s'r"isii' up iioiii fiopoAeli'
;, certainly SAD the aeFohaut, III
pressed; take IT, ana look IN at tn
llttie ehu.
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