glancing up“The Doctor kept glancing up uneasily”
“The Doctor kept glancing up uneasily”
After supper was despatched, the Doctor kept me busy for some hours taking down notes. There was much to be recorded of this first day in a new world. The temperature; the direction and force of the wind; the time of our arrival—as near as it could be guessed; the air pressure (he had brought along a small barometer among his instruments) and many other things which, while they were dry stuff for the ordinary mortal, were highly important for the scientist.
Often and often I have wished that I had one of those memories that seem to be able to recall all impressions no matter how small and unimportant. For instance I have often wanted to remember exactly the first awakening on the Moon. We had all been weary enough with excitement and exercise, when we went to bed, to sleep soundly. All I can remember of my waking up is spending at least ten minutes working out where I was. And I doubt if I could have done it even then if I had not finally realized that John Dolittle was awake ahead of me and already pottering around among his instruments, taking readings.
The immediate business now on hand was food. There was literally nothing for breakfast. The Doctor began to regret his hasty departure from the moth. Indeed it was only now, many, many hours after we had left him in our unceremonious haste to find the tree and explore the new world, that we realized that we had not as yet seen any signs of animal life. Still it seemed a long way to go back and consult him; and it was by no means certain that he would still be there.
Just the same, we needed food and food we were going to find. Hastily we bundled together what things we had unpacked for the night’s camping. Which way to go? Clearly if we had here reached one tree, there must be some direction in which others lay, where we could find that water which the Doctor was so sure must exist. But we could scan the horizon with staring eyes or telescope as much as we wished and not another leaf of a tree could we see.
This time without waiting to be ordered Polynesia soared into the air to do a little scouting.
“Well,” she said on her return, “I don’t see any actual trees at all. The beastly landscape is more like the Sahara Desert than any scenery I’ve ever run into. But over there behind that higher range—the one with the curious hat-shaped peak in the middle—you see the one I mean?”
“Yes,” said the Doctor. “I see. Go on.”
“Well, behind that there is a dark horizon different from any other quarter. I won’t swear it is trees. But myself, I feel convinced that there is something else there besides sand. We had better get moving. It is no short walk.”
Indeed itwasno short walk. It came to be a forced march or race between us and starvation. On starting out we had not foreseen anything of the kind. Going off without breakfast was nothing after all. Each one of us had done that before many a time. But as hour after hour went by and still the landscape remained a desert of rolling sand-dunes, hills and dead dry volcanoes, our spirits fell lower and lower.
This was one of the times when I think I saw John Dolittle really at his best. I know, although I had not questioned him, that he had already been beset with anxiety over several matters on the first steps of our march. Later he spoke of them to me: not at the time. And as conditions grew worse, as hunger gnawed at our vitals and the most terrible thirst parched our tongues—as strength and vitality began to give way and mere walking became the most terrible hardship, the Doctor grew cheerier and cheerier. He didn’t crack dry jokes in an irritating way either. But by some strange means he managed to keep the whole party in good mood. If he told a funny story it was always at the right time and set us all laughing at our troubles. In talking to him afterwards about this I learned that he had, when a young man, been employed on more than one exploration trip to keep the expedition in good humor. It was, he said, the only way he could persuade the chief to take him, since at that time he had no scientific training to recommend him.
soared into the air“Polynesia soared into the air”
“Polynesia soared into the air”
Anyway I sincerely doubt whether our party would have held out if it had not been for his sympathetic and cheering company. The agonies of thirst were something new to me. Every step I thought must be my last.
cool between my lips“I remember Chee-Chee trickling something cool between my lips”
“I remember Chee-Chee trickling something cool between my lips”
Finally at what seemed to be the end of our second day, I vaguely heard Polynesia saying something about “Forests ahead!” I imagine I must have been half delirious by then. I still staggered along, blindly following the others. I know wedidreach water because before I fell and dozed away into a sort of half faint I remember Chee-Chee trickling something marvelously cool between my lips out of a cup made from a folded leaf.
THE FOURTH CHAPTERChee-Chee the Hero
When Iawoke I felt very much ashamed of myself. What an explorer! The Doctor was moving around already—and, of course, Chee-Chee and Polynesia. John Dolittle came to my side immediately he saw I was awake.
As though he knew the thoughts that were in my mind he at once started to reprimand me for feeling ashamed of my performance. He pointed out that after all Chee-Chee and Polynesia were accustomed to traveling in hot dry climates and that so, for that matter, was he himself.
“Taken all in all, Stubbins,” said he, “your own performance has been extremely good. You made the trip, the whole way, and only collapsed when relief was in sight. No one could ask for more than that. I have known many experienced explorers who couldn’t have done nearly as well. It was a hard lap—a devilish hard lap. You were magnificent. Sit up and have some breakfast. Thank goodness, we’ve reached food at last!”
Weak and frowsty, I sat up. Arranged immediately around me was a collection of what I later learned were fruits. The reliable Chee-Chee, scared though he might be of a moving tree or a whispering wind, had served the whole party with that wonderful sense of his for scenting out wild foodstuffs. Not one of the strange courses on the bill of fare had I or the Doctor seen before. But if Chee-Chee said they were safe we knew we need not fear.
Some of the fruits were as big as a large trunk; some as small as a walnut. But, starving as we were, we just dived in and ate and ate and ate. Water there was too, gathered in the shells of enormous nuts and odd vessels made from twisted leaves. Never has a breakfast tasted so marvelous as did that one of fruits which I could not name.
big as a trunk“Some of the fruits were as big as a trunk”
“Some of the fruits were as big as a trunk”
Chee-Chee!—Poor little timid Chee-Chee, who conquered your own fears and volunteered to go ahead of us, alone, into the jungle to find food when our strength was giving out. To the world you were just an organ-grinder’s monkey. But to us whom you saved from starvation, when terror beset you at every step, you will forever be ranked high in the list of the great heroes of all time. Thank goodness we had you with us! Our bones might to-day be mouldering in the sands of the Moon if it had not been for your un-taught science, your jungle skill—and, above all, your courage that overcame your fear!
Well, to return: as I ate these strange fruits and sipped the water that brought life back I gazed upward and saw before me a sort of ridge. On its level top a vegetation, a kind of tangled forest, flourished; and trailing down from this ridge were little outposts of the Vegetable Kingdom, groups of bushes and single trees, that scattered and dribbled away in several directions from the main mass. Why and how that lone tree survived so far away we could never satisfactorily explain. The nearest John Dolittle could come to it was that some underground spring supplied it with enough water or moisture to carry on. Yet there can be no doubt that to have reached such enormous proportions it must have been there hundreds—perhaps thousands—of years. Anyway it is a good thing for us itwasthere. If it had not been, as a pointer towards this habitable quarter of the Moon—it is most likely our whole expedition would have perished.
When the Doctor and I had finished our mysterious breakfast we started to question Chee-Chee about the forest from which he had produced the food we had eaten.
“ ‘I climbed a tree’ ”
“ ‘I climbed a tree’ ”
“I don’t know how I did it,” said Chee-Chee when we asked him, “I just shut my eyes most of the time—terribly afraid. I passed trees, plants, creepers, roots. I smelt—Goodness! I too was hungry, remember. I smelt hard as I could. And soon of course I spotted food, fruits. I climbed a tree—half the time with my eyes shut. Then I see some monster, golly! What a jungle—different from any monkey ever seen before—Woolly, woolly!—Ooh, ooh! All the same, nuts smell good. Catch a few. Chase down the tree. Run some more. Smell again. Good!—Up another tree. Different fruit, good just the same. Catch a few. Down again. Run home. On the way smell good root. Same as ginger—only better. Dig a little. Keep eyes shut—don’t want to see monster. Catch a piece of root. Run all the way home. Here I am. Finish!”
Well, dear old Chee-Chee’s story was descriptive of his own heroic adventures but it did not give us much idea of the moon forest which we were to explore. Nevertheless, rested and fit, we now felt much more inclined to look into things ourselves.
Leaving what luggage we had brought with us from our original landing point, we proceeded towards the line of trees at the summit of the bluff, about four miles ahead of us. We now felt that we could find our way back without much difficulty to the two last camps we had established.
The going was about the same, loose sand—only that as we approached the bluff we found the sand firmer to the tread.
On the way up the last lap towards the vegetation line we were out of view of the top itself. Often the going was steep. All the way I had the feeling that we were about to make new and great discoveries—that for the first time we were to learn something important about the true nature of the mysterious Moon.
THE FIFTH CHAPTEROn the Plateau
Indeedour first close acquaintance with the forests of the Moon was made in quite a dramatic manner. If it had been on a stage it could not have been arranged better for effect. Suddenly as our heads topped the bluff we saw a wall of jungle some mile or so ahead of us. It would take a very long time to describe those trees in detail. It wasn’t that there were so many kinds but each one was so utterly different from any tree we had seen on the Earth. And yet, curiously enough, they did remind you of vegetable forms you had seen, but not of trees.
For instance, there was one whole section, several square miles in extent apparently, that looked exactly like ferns. Another reminded me of a certain flowering plant (I can’t recall the name of it) which grows a vast number of small blossoms on a flat surface at the top. The stems are a curious whitish green. This moon tree wasexactlythe same, only nearly a thousand times as big. The denseness of the foliage (or flowering) at the top was so compact and solid that we later found no rain could penetrate it. And for this reason the Doctor and I gave it the name of theUmbrella Tree. But not one single tree was there which was the same as any tree we had seen before. And there were many, many more curious growths that dimly reminded you of something, though you could not always say exactly what.
approached the bluff“We approached the bluff on whose brow the vegetation flourished”
“We approached the bluff on whose brow the vegetation flourished”
One odd thing that disturbed us quite a little was a strange sound. Noises of any kind, no matter how faint, we already knew could travel long distances on the Moon. As soon as we had gained the plateau on top of the bluff we heard it. It was a musical sound. And yet not the sound of a single instrument. It seemed almost as though there was a small orchestra somewhere playing very, very softly. We were by this time becoming accustomed to strange things. But I must confess that this distant hidden music upset me quite a little and so, I know, it did the Doctor.
umbrella treeThe Umbrella Tree
The Umbrella Tree
At the top of the bluff we rested to get our wind before we covered the last mile up to the jungle itself. It was curious how clearly marked and separated were those sections of the Moon’s landscape. And yet doubtless the smaller scale of all the geographical features of this world, so much less in bulk than our own, could partly account for that. In front of us a plateau stretched out, composed of hard sand, level and smooth as a lake, bounded in front by the jungle and to the rear of us by the cliff we had just scaled. I wondered as I looked across at the forest what scenery began on the other side of the woods and if it broke off in as sharp a change as it did here.
As the most important thing to attend to first was the establishment of a water supply, Chee-Chee was asked to act as guide. The monkey set out ahead of us to follow his own tracks which he had made last night. This he had little difficulty in doing across the open plateau. But when we reached the edge of the forest it was not so easy. Much of his traveling here had been done by swinging through the trees. He always felt safer so, he said, while explaining to us how he had been guided to the water by the sense of smell.
Again I realized how lucky we had been to have him with us. No one but a monkey could have found his way through that dense, dimly lit forest to water. He asked us to stay behind a moment on the edge of the woods while he went forward to make sure that he could retrace his steps. We sat down again and waited.
“Did you wake up at all during the night, Stubbins?” the Doctor asked after a little.
“No,” I said. “I was far too tired. Why?”
“Did you, Polynesia?” he asked, ignoring my question.
“Yes,” said she. “I was awake several times.”
“Did you hear or see anything er—unusual?”
“Yes,” said she. “I can’t be absolutely certain. But I sort of felt there was something moving around the camp keeping a watch on us.”
“Humph!” muttered the Doctor. “So did I.”
Then he relapsed into silence.
awake several times“‘Yes,’ said she, ‘I was awake several times’”
“‘Yes,’ said she, ‘I was awake several times’”
Another rather strange thing that struck me as I gazed over the landscape while we waited for Chee-Chee to return was the appearance of the horizon. The Moon’s width being so much smaller than the Earth’s, the distance one could see was a great deal shorter. This did not apply so much where the land was hilly or mountainous; but on the level, or the nearly level, it made a very striking difference. Theroundnessof this world was much more easily felt and understood than was that of the world we had left. On this plateau, for example, you could only see seven or eight miles, it seemed, over the level before the curve cut off your vision. And it gave quite a new character even to the hills, where peaks showed behind other ranges, dropping downward in a way that misled you entirely as to their actual height.
they were not“‘You bet they were not!’ grunted Polynesia”
“‘You bet they were not!’ grunted Polynesia”
Finally Chee-Chee came back to us and said he had successfully retraced his steps to the water he had found the night before. He was now prepared to lead us to it. He looked kind of scared and ill at ease. The Doctor asked him the reason for this, but he didn’t seem able to give any.
“Everything’s all right, Doctor,” said he—“at least I suppose it is. It was partly that—oh, I don’t know—I can’t quite make out what it is they have asked you here for. I haven’t actually laid eyes on any animal life since we left the moth who brought us. Yet I feel certain that there’s lots of it here. It doesn’t appear to want to be seen. That’s what puzzles me. On the Earth the animals were never slow in coming forward when they were in need of your services.”
“You bet they were not!” grunted Polynesia. “No one who ever saw them clamoring around the surgery door could doubt that.”
“Humph!” the Doctor muttered. “I’ve noticed it myself already. I don’t understand it quite—either. It almost looks as though there were something about our arrival which they didn’t like. . . . I wonder. . . . Well, anyway, I wish the animal life here would get in touch with us and let us know what it is all about. This state of things is, to say the least—er—upsetting.”
THE SIXTH CHAPTERThe Moon Lake
Andso we went forward with Chee-Chee as guide to find the water. Our actual entrance into that jungle was quite an experience and very different from merely a distant view of it. The light outside was not bright; inside the woods it was dimmer still. My only other experience of jungle life had been in Spidermonkey Island. This was something like the Spidermonkey forest and yet it was strikingly different.
From the appearance and size of that first tree we had reached, the Doctor had guessed its age to be very, very great. Here the vegetable life in general seemed to bear out that idea beyond all question. The enormous trees with their gigantic trunks looked as though they had been there since the beginning of time. And there was surprisingly little decay—a few shed limbs and leaves. That was all. In unkept earthly forests one saw dead trees everywhere, fallen to the ground or caught half-way in the crotches of other trees, withered and dry. Not so here. Every tree looked as though it had stood so and grown in peace for centuries.
At length after a good deal of arduous travel—the going for the most part was made slow by the heaviest kind of undergrowth, with vines and creepers as thick as your leg—we came to a sort of open place in which lay a broad calm lake with a pleasant waterfall at one end. The woods that surrounded it were most peculiar. They looked like enormous asparagus. For many, many square miles their tremendous masts rose, close together, in ranks. No creepers or vines had here been given a chance to flourish. The enormous stalks had taken up all the room and the nourishment of the crowded earth. The tapering tops, hundreds of feet above our heads, looked good enough to eat. Yet I’ve no doubt that if we had ever got up to them they would have been found as hard as oaks.
The Doctor walked down to the clean sandy shore of the lake and tried the water. Chee-Chee and I did the same. It was pure and clear and quenching to the thirst. The lake must have been at least five miles wide in the center.
“I would like,” said John Dolittle, “to explore this by boat. Do you suppose, Chee-Chee, that we could find the makings of a canoe or a raft anywhere?”
“I should think so,” said the monkey. “Wait a minute and I will take a look around and see.”
So, with Chee-Chee in the lead, we proceeded along the shore in search of materials for a boat. On account of that scarcity of dead or dried wood which we had already noticed, our search did not at first appear a very promising one. Nearly all the standing trees were pretty heavy and full of sap. For our work of boat building a light hatchet on the Doctor’s belt was the best tool we had. It looked sadly small compared with the great timber that reared up from the shores of the lake.
But after we had gone along about a mile I noticed Chee-Chee up ahead stop and peer into the jungle. Then, after he had motioned to us with his hand to hurry, he disappeared into the edge of the forest. On coming up with him we found him stripping the creepers and moss off some contrivance that lay just within the woods, not more than a hundred yards from the water’s edge.
We all fell to, helping him, without any idea of what it might be we were uncovering. There seemed almost no end to it. It was a long object, immeasurably long. To me it looked like a dead tree—the first dead, lying tree we had seen.
“What do you think it is, Chee-Chee?” asked the Doctor.
“It’s a boat,” said the monkey in a firm and matter-of-fact voice. “No doubt of it at all in my mind. It’s a dug-out canoe. They used to use them in Africa.”
“But, Chee-Chee,” cried John Dolittle, “look at the length! It’s a full-sized Asparagus Tree. We’ve uncovered a hundred feet of it already and still there’s more to come.”
“I can’t help that,” said Chee-Chee. “It’s a dug-out canoe just the same. Crawl down with me here underneath it, Doctor, and I’ll show you the marks of tools and fire. It has been turned upside down.”
With the monkey guiding him, the Doctor scrabbled down below the queer object; and when he came forth there was a puzzled look on his face.
“Well, theymightbe the marks of tools, Chee-Chee,” he was saying. “But then again they might not. The traces of fire are more clear. But that could be accidental. If the tree burned down it could very easily—”
“The natives in my part of Africa,” Chee-Chee interrupted, “always used fire to eat out the insides of their dug-out canoes. They built little fires all along the tree, to hollow out the trunk so that they could sit in it. The tools they used were very simple, just stone scoops to chop out the charred wood with. I am sure this is a canoe, Doctor. But it hasn’t been used in a long time. See how the bow has been shaped up into a point.”
“I know,” said the Doctor. “But the Asparagus Tree has a natural point at one end anyhow.”
“And, Chee-Chee,” put in Polynesia, “who in the name of goodness could ever handle such a craft? Why, look, the thing is as long as a battleship!”
Then followed a half-hour’s discussion, between the Doctor and Polynesia on the one side and Chee-Chee on the other, as to whether the find we had made was, or was not, a canoe. For me, I had no opinion. To my eyes the object looked like an immensely long log, hollowed somewhat on the one side, but whether by accident or design I could not tell.
In any case it was certainly too heavy and cumbersome for us to use. And presently I edged into the argument with the suggestion that we go on further and find materials for a raft or boat wecouldhandle.
The Doctor seemed rather glad of this excuse to end a fruitless controversy, and soon we moved on in search of something which would enable us to explore the waters of the lake. A march of a mile further along the shore brought us to the woods that were not so heavy. Here the immense asparagus forests gave way to a growth of smaller girth; and the Doctor’s hatchet soon felled enough poles for us to make a raft from. We laced them together with thongs of bark and found them sufficiently buoyant when launched to carry us and our small supply of baggage with ease. Where the water was shallow we used a long pole to punt with; and when we wished to explore greater depths we employed sweeps, or oars, which we fashioned roughly with the hatchet.
From the first moment we were afloat the Doctor kept me busy taking notes for him. In the equipment he had brought with him there was a fine-meshed landing net: and with it he searched along the shores for signs of life in this moon lake, the first of its kind we had met with.
“It is very important, Stubbins,” said he, “to find out what fish we have here. In evolution the fish life is a very important matter.”
“What isevolution?” asked Chee-Chee.
long pole to punt“We used a long pole to punt with”
“We used a long pole to punt with”
I started out to explain it to him but was soon called upon by the Doctor to make more notes—for which I was not sorry, as the task turned out to be a long and heavy one. Polynesia however took it up where I left off and made short work of it.
“Evolution, Chee-Chee,” said she, “is the story of how Tommy got rid of the tail you are carrying—because he didn’t need it any more—and the story of how you grew it and kept it because youdidneed it. . . .Evolution!Poof!—Professors’ talk. A long word for a simple matter.”
It turned out that our examination of the lake was neither exciting nor profitable. We brought up all sorts of water-flies, many larvæ of perfectly tremendous size, but we found as yet no fishes. The plant life—water plant I mean—was abundant.
“I think,” said the Doctor, after we had poled ourselves around the lake for several hours, “that there can be no doubt now that the Vegetable Kingdom here is much more important than the Animal Kingdom. And what there is of the Animal Kingdom seems to be mostly insect. However, we will camp on the shore of this pleasant lake and perhaps we shall see more later.”
So we brought our raft to anchor at about the place from which he had started out and pitched camp on a stretch of clean yellow sand.
I shall never forget that night. It was uncanny. None of us slept well. All through the hours of darkness we heard things moving around us. Enormous things. Yet never did we see them or find out what they were. The four of us were nevertheless certain we were being watched. Even Polynesia was disturbed. There seemed no doubt that there was plenty of animal life in the Moon, but it did not as yet want to show itself to us. The newness of our surroundings alone was disturbing enough, without this very uncomfortable feeling that something had made the moon folks distrustful of us.
THE SEVENTH CHAPTERTracks of a Giant
Anotherthing which added to our sleeplessness that night was the continuance of the mysterious music. But then so many strange things contributed to our general mystification and vague feeling of anxiety that it is hard to remember and distinguish them all.
The next morning after breakfasting on what remained of our fruits we packed up and started off for further exploration. While the last of the packing had been in progress Chee-Chee and Polynesia had gone ahead to do a little advanced scouting for us. They formed an admirable team for such work. Polynesia would fly above the forest and get long-distance impressions from the air of what lay ahead while Chee-Chee would examine the more lowly levels of the route to be followed, from the trees and the ground.
The Doctor and I were just helping one another on with our packs when Chee-Chee came rushing back to us in great excitement. His teeth were chattering so he could hardly speak.
“What do you think, Doctor!” he stammered. “We’ve found tracks back there. Tracks of a man! But so enormous! You’ve no idea. Come quick and I’ll show you.”
The Doctor looked up sharply at the scared and excited monkey, pausing a moment as though about to question him. Then he seemed to change his mind and turned once more to the business of taking up the baggage. With loads hoisted we gave a last glance around the camping ground to see if anything had been forgotten or left.
what do you think“‘What do you think, Doctor?’ he stammered”
“‘What do you think, Doctor?’ he stammered”
Our route did not lie directly across the lake, which mostly sprawled away to the right of our line of march. But we had to make our way partly around the lower end of it. Wondering what new chapter lay ahead of us, we fell in behind Chee-Chee and in silence started off along the shore.
After about half an hour’s march we came to the mouth of a river which ran into the upper end of the lake. Along the margin of this we followed Chee-Chee for what seemed like another mile or so. Soon the shores of the stream widened out and the woods fell back quite a distance from the water’s edge. The nature of the ground was still clean firm sand. Presently we saw Polynesia’s tiny figure ahead, waiting for us.
When we drew up with her we saw that she was standing by an enormous foot-print. There was no doubt about its being a man’s, clear in every detail. It was the most gigantic thing I have ever seen, a barefoot track fully four yards in length. There wasn’t only one, either. Down the shore the trail went on for a considerable distance; and the span that the prints lay apart gave one some idea of the enormous stride of the giant who had left this trail behind him.
Questioning and alarmed, Chee-Chee and Polynesia gazed silently up at the Doctor for an explanation.
“Humph!” he muttered after a while. “So Man is here, too. My goodness, what a monster! Let us follow the trail.”
Chee-Chee was undoubtedly scared of such a plan. It was clearly both his and Polynesia’s idea that the further we got away from the maker of those tracks the better. I could see terror and fright in the eyes of both of them. But neither made any objection; and in silence we plodded along, following in the path of this strange human who must, it would seem, be something out of a fairy tale.
But alas! It was not more than a mile further on that the foot-prints turned into the woods where, on the mosses and leaves beneath the trees, no traces had been left at all. Then we turned about and followed the river quite a distance to see if the creature had come back out on the sands again. But never a sign could we see. Chee-Chee spent a good deal of time too at the Doctor’s request trying to find his path through the forest by any signs, such as broken limbs or marks in the earth which he might have left behind. But not another trace could we find. Deciding that he had merely come down to the stream to get a drink, we gave up the pursuit and turned back to the line of our original march.
enormous footprint“An enormous foot-print”
“An enormous foot-print”
Again I was thankful that I had company on that expedition. It was certainly a most curious and extraordinary experience. None of us spoke very much but when we did it seemed that all of us had been thinking the same things.
The woods grew more and more mysterious, and more and morealive, as we went onward towards the other side of the Moon, the side that earthly Man had never seen before. For one thing, the strange music seemed to increase; and for another, there was more movement in the limbs of the trees. Great branches that looked like arms, bunches of small twigs that could have been hands, swung and moved and clawed the air in the most uncanny fashion. And always that steady wind went on blowing, even, regular and smooth.
All of the forest was not gloomy however. Much of it was unbelievably beautiful. Acres of woods there were which presented nothing but a gigantic sea of many-colored blossoms, colors that seemed like something out of a dream, indescribable, yet clear in one’s memory as a definite picture of something seen.
The Doctor as we went forward spoke very little; when he did it was almost always on the same subject: “the absence of decay,” as he put it.
“I am utterly puzzled, Stubbins,” said he, in one of his longer outbursts when we were resting. “Why, there is hardly any leaf-mould at all!”
“What difference would that make, Doctor?” I asked.
“Well, that’s what the trees live on, mostly, in our world,” said he. “The forest growth, I mean—the soil that is formed by dying trees and rotting leaves—that is the nourishment that brings forth the seedlings which finally grow into new trees. But here! Well, of course there issomesoil—and some shedding of leaves. But I’ve hardly seen a dead tree since I’ve been in these woods. One would almost think that there were some—er—balance. Somearrangementof—er—well—I can’t explain it. . . . It beats me entirely.”
I did not, at the time, completely understand what he meant. And yet it did seem as though every one of these giant plants that rose about us led a life of peaceful growth, undisturbed by rot, by blight or by disease.
movement in the limgs of the tree“There was more movement in the limbs of the trees”
“There was more movement in the limbs of the trees”
Suddenly in our march we found ourselves at the end of the wooded section. Hills and mountains again spread before us. They were not the same as those we had first seen, however. These had vegetation, of a kind, on them. Low shrubs and heath plants clothed this rolling land with a dense growth—often very difficult to get through.
But still no sign of decay—little or no leaf-mould. The Doctor now decided that perhaps part of the reason for this was the seasons—or rather the lack of seasons. He said that we would probably find that here there was no regular winter or summer. It was an entirely new problem, so far as the struggle for existence was concerned, such as we knew in our world.
THE EIGHTH CHAPTERThe Singing Trees
Intothis new heath and hill country we traveled for miles. And presently we arrived upon a rather curious thing. It was a sort of basin high up and enclosed by hills or knolls. The strange part of it was that here there were not only more tracks of the Giant Man, just as we had seen lower down, but there were also unmistakable signs offire. In an enormous hollow ashes lay among the sands. The Doctor was very interested in those ashes. He took some and added chemicals to them and tested them in many ways. He confessed himself at last entirely puzzled by their nature. But he said he nevertheless felt quite sure we had stumbled on the scene of the smoke signaling we had seen from Puddleby. Curiously long ago, it seemed, that time when Too-Too, the owl, had insisted he saw smoke burst from the side of the Moon. That was when the giant moth lay helpless in our garden. And yet—how long was it? Only a few days!
“It was from here, Stubbins,” said the Doctor, “that the signals we saw from the Earth were given out, I feel certain. This place, as you see, is miles and miles across. But what was used to make an explosion as large as the one we saw from my house I have no idea.”
“But it was smoke we saw,” said I, “not a flash.”
“That’s just it,” he said. “Some curious material must have been used that we have as yet no knowledge of. I thought that by testing the ashes I could discover what it was. But I can’t. However we may yet find out.”
sort of basin“It was a sort of basin”
“It was a sort of basin”
For two reasons the Doctor was anxious for the present not to get too far from the forest section. (We did not know then, you see, that there were other wooded areas beside this through which we had just come.) One reason was that we had to keep in touch with our food supply which consisted of the fruits and vegetables of the jungle. The other was that John Dolittle was absorbed now in the study of this Vegetable Kingdom which he felt sure had many surprises in store for the student naturalist.
After a while we began to get over the feeling of uncanny creepiness, which at the beginning had made us so uncomfortable. We decided that our fears were mostly caused by the fact that these woods and plants were so different from our own. There was no unfriendliness in these forests after all, we assured ourselves—except that wewerebeing watched. That we knew—and that we were beginning to get used to.
As soon as the Doctor had decided that we would set up our new headquarters on the edge of the forest, and we had our camp properly established, we began making excursions in all directions through the jungle. And from then on I was again kept very busy taking notes of the Doctor’s experiments and studies.
One of the first discoveries we made in our study of the Moon’s Vegetable Kingdom was that there was practically no warfare going on between it and the Animal Kingdom. In the world we had left we had been accustomed to see the horses and other creatures eating up the grass in great quantities and many further examples of the struggle that continually goes on between the two. Here, on the other hand, the animals (or, more strictly speaking, the insects, for there seemed as yet hardly any traces of other animal species) and the vegetable life seemed for the most part to help one another rather than to fight and destroy. Indeed we found the whole system of Life on the Moon a singularly peaceful business. I will speak of this again later on.
We spent three whole days in the investigation of the strange music we had heard. You will remember that the Doctor, with his skill on the flute, was naturally fond of music; and this curious thing we had met with interested him a great deal. After several expeditions we found patches of the jungle where we were able to see and hear the tree music working at its best.
There was no doubt about it at all: The trees were making the sounds and they were doing itdeliberately. In the way that an Æolian harp works when set in the wind at the right angle, the trees moved their branches to meet the wind so that certain notes would be given out. The evening that the Doctor made this discovery of what he called theSinging Trees, he told me to mark down in the diary of the expedition as a Red Letter Date. I shall never forget it. We had been following the sound for hours, the Doctor carrying a tuning-fork in his hand, ringing it every once in a while to make sure of the notes we heard around us. Suddenly we came upon a little clearing about which great giants of the forest stood in a circle. It was for all the world like an orchestra. Spellbound, we stood and gazed up at them, as first one and then another would turn a branch to the steady blowing wind and a note would boom out upon the night, clear and sweet. Then a group, three or four trees around the glade, would swing a limb and a chord would strike the air, and go murmuring through the jungle. Fantastic and crazy as it sounds, no one could have any doubt who heard and watched that these trees were actually making sounds, which theywanted to make, with the aid of the wind.
Of course, as the Doctor remarked, unless the wind had always blown steadily and evenly such a thing would have been impossible. John Dolittle himself was most anxious to find out on what scale of music they were working. To me, I must confess, it sounded just mildly pleasant. Therewasa time: I could hear that. And some whole phrases repeated once in a while, but not often. For the most part the melody was wild, sad and strange. But even to my uneducated ear it was beyond all question a quite clear effort at orchestration; there were certainly treble voices and bass voices and the combination was sweet and agreeable.
spellbound“Spellbound we gazed up at them”
“Spellbound we gazed up at them”
I was excited enough myself, but the Doctor was worked up to a pitch of interest such as I have seldom seen in him.
“Why, Stubbins,” said he, “do you realize what this means?—It’s terrific. If these trees can sing, a choir understands one another and all that,they must have a language.—They can talk! A language in the Vegetable Kingdom! We must get after it. Who knows? I may yet learn it myself. Stubbins, this is a great day!”
watching certain shrubs“For quite a long while he sat watching certain shrubs”
“For quite a long while he sat watching certain shrubs”
And so, as usual on such occasions, the good man’s enthusiasm just carried him away bodily. For days, often without food, often without sleep, he pursued this new study. And at his heels I trotted with my note book always ready—though, to be sure, he put in far more work than I did because frequently when we got home he would go on wrestling for hours over the notes or new apparatus he was building, by which he hoped to learn the language of the trees.
You will remember that even before we left the Earth John Dolittle had mentioned the possibility of the moon-bells having some means of communicating with one another. That they could move, within the limits of their fixed position, had been fully established. To that we had grown so used and accustomed that we no longer thought anything of it. The Doctor had in fact wondered if this might possibly be a means of conversation in itself—the movement of limbs and twigs and leaves, something like a flag signal code. And for quite a long while he sat watching certain trees and shrubs to see if they used this method for talking between themselves.