A part of the flooring about six feet square slid noiselessly away; then he pulled another lever on the opposite side and a similar piece disappeared, leaving a large space covered only by a thick plate of absolutely transparent glass.

He switched off the lights again and led her to the edge of it, and said: "There is your native world, dear.

That is your Mother Earth." Wonderful as the moon had seemed, the gorgeous spectacle which lay seemingly at her feet was infinitely more magnificent.

A vast disc of silver grey, streaked and dotted with lines and points of dazzling lights, and more than half covered with vast, glimmering, greyish-green expanses, seemed to form the floor of the tremendous gulf beneath them.
They were not yet too far away to make out the general features of the continents and oceans, and fortunately the hemisphere presented to them happened to be singularly free from clouds.
To the right spread out the majestic outlines of the continents of North and South America, and to the left Asia, the Malay Archipelago, and Australia.

At the top was a vast, roughly circular area of dazzling whiteness, and Redgrave, pointing to this, said: "There, look up a little further north than the middle of that white patch, and you'll see what no eyes but yours and mine have ever seen--the North Pole! When we come back we shall see the South Pole, because we shall approach the earth from the other end, as it were.
"I suppose you recognise a good deal of the picture.