of my coming sea voyage in search of sport and adventure.

Before the reading of that letter was completed lions and lion-hunting

had fled my thoughts, and I was in a state of excitement bordering

upon frenzy.

It--well, read it yourself, and see if you, too, do not find food

for frantic conjecture, for tantalizing doubts, and for a great

hope.

Here it is:

DEAR SIR: I think that I have run across one of the most remarkable

coincidences in modern literature. But let me start at the beginning:

I am, by profession, a wanderer upon the face of the earth. I have

no trade--nor any other occupation.

My father bequeathed me a competency; some remoter ancestors lust

to roam. I have combined the two and invested them carefully and

without extravagance.

I became interested in your story, At the Earth's Core, not so much

because of the probability of the tale as of a great and abiding

wonder that people should be paid real money for writing such

impossible trash. You will pardon my candor, but it is necessary

that you understand my mental attitude toward this particular

story--that you may credit that which fol-lows.

Shortly thereafter I started for the Sahara in search of a rather

rare species of antelope that is to be found only occasionally

within a limited area at a certain season of the year. My chase

led me far from the haunts of man.

It was a fruitless search, however, in so far as antelope is

concerned; but one night as I lay courting sleep at the edge of a

little cluster of date-palms that surround an ancient well in the

midst of the arid, shifting sands, I suddenly became conscious of

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