The Moon Metal | Page 9

the shifting photographic tape, or whatever the mechanism
may have been, appeared to have settled upon a chosen scene, and there
it rested. A broad champaign reached away to distant sapphire

mountains, while the foreground was occupied by a magnificent house,
resembling a large country villa, fronted with a garden, shaded by
bowers and festoons of huge, brilliant flowers. Birds of radiant
plumage flitted among the trees and blossoms, and then appeared a
company of gayly attired people, including many young girls, who
joined hands and danced in a ring, apparently with shouts of laughter,
while a group of musicians standing near thrummed and blew upon
curiously shaped instruments.
Suddenly the shadow of a dense cloud flitted across the scene;
whereupon the brilliant birds flew away with screams of terror which
almost seemed to reach the ears of the onlookers through the wall. An
expression of horror came over the faces of the people. The children
broke from their merry circle and ran for protection to their elders. The
utmost confusing and whelming terror were evidenced for a
moment--then the ground split asunder, and the house and the garden,
with all their living occupants were swallowed by an awful chasm
which opened just where they had stood. The great rent ran in a
widening line across the sunlit landscape until it reached the horizon,
when the distant mountains crumbled, clouds poured in from all sides
at once, and billows of flame burst through them as they veiled the
scene.
But in another instant the commotion was over, and the world whose
curious spectacles had been enacted as if on the other side of a window,
seemed to retreat swiftly into space, until at last, emerging from a
fleecy cloud, it reappeared in the form of the full moon hanging in the
sky, but larger than is its wont, with its dry ocean-beds, its keen-spired
peaks, its ragged mountain ranges, its gaping chasms, its immense
crater rings, and Tycho, the chief of them all, shooting raylike streaks
across the scarred face of the abandoned lunar globe. The show was
ended, and Dr. Syx, turning on only a partial illumination in the room,
rose slowly to his feet, his tall form appearing strangely magnified in
the gloom, and invited his bewildered guests to accompany him to his
house, outside the mill, where he said dinner awaited them. As they
emerged into daylight they acted like persons just aroused from an
opiate dream.

V
WONDERS OF THE NEW METAL
Within a twelvemonth after the visit of President Boon and his fellow
financiers to the mine in the Grand Teton a railway had been
constructed from Jackson's Hole, connecting with one of the Pacific
lines, and the distribution of the new metal was begun. All of Dr. Syx's
terms had been accepted. United States troops occupied a permanent
encampment on the upper waters of the Snake River, to afford
protection, and as the consignments of precious ingots were hurried
east and west on guarded trains, the mints all over the world resumed
their activity. Once more a common monetary standard prevailed, and
commerce revived as if touched by a magic wand.
Artemisium quickly won its way in popular favor. Its matchless beauty
alone was enough. Not only was it gladly accepted in the form of
money, but its success was instantaneous in the arts. Dr. Syx and the
inspectors representing the various nations found it difficult to limit the
output to the agreed upon amount. The demand was incessant.
Goldsmiths and jewellers continually discovered new excellences in the
wonderful metal. Its properties of translucence and refraction enabled
skilful artists to perform marvels. By suitable management a chain of
artemisium could be made to resemble a string of vari-colored gems,
each separate link having a tint of its own, while, as the wearer moved,
delicate complementary colors chased one another, in rapid undulation,
from end to end.
A fresh charm was added by the new metal to the personal adornment
of women, and an enhanced splendor to the pageants of society. Gold
in its palmiest days had never enjoyed such a vogue. A crowded
reception room or a dinner party where artemisium abounded possessed
an indescribable atmosphere of luxury and richness, refined in quality,
yet captivating to every sense. Imaginative persons went so far as to
aver that the sight and presence of the metal exercised a strangely

soothing and dreamy power over the mind, like the influence of
moonlight streaming through the tree-tops on a still, balmy night.
The public curiosity in regard to the origin of artemisium was
boundless. The various nations published official bulletins in which the
general facts--omitting, of course, such incidents as the singular
exhibition seen by the visiting financiers on the wall of Dr. Syx's
office--were detailed to gratify the universal desire