They were approaching their next destination, and the dark globe of the planet had just come into view on the horizon.  Rapidly it increased in size as they neared it, and the seas and continents could be easily traced.

“Dear me?” exclaimed Mr. Punch.  “Why, I declare if there is not something written upon it!” and he put up his binoculars, “Why, it is nothing more nor less than a big advertisement.  Looks like humbug,” he continued.  “What’s the name of the Planet, eh?”

“Mercury,” replied Father TIME, with cheery spirit; “and with that device they try to catch the eye of a passing Comet.”

“Hum—­they won’t catch me!” observed the Sage, brightly.  “I brought my truth-compeller with me—­a little, patent, electrical hypnotic arrangement, in the shape of this ring”—­he showed it as he spoke.  “I have only to turn it on my finger, and it obliges anyone who may be addressing me instantly to speak the truth.”

They suddenly found themselves deposited in the centre of a vast square, surrounded by large palatial-looking buildings, public offices, stores, shops, picture-galleries, gigantic blocks of private residences, in flats five-and-twenty storeys high, and other architectural developments of the latest constructive crazes, fashioned, apparently, after the same models, and on similar lines, to those at present so much in vogue in that now distant planet, the Earth.  There was a profusion of advertisement-boards, these, in many instances, entirely covering the whole facade of the building with large-lettered announcements of the nature of the trade or business conducted within.  An eager and excited crowd thronging the pavements, and hustling each other, without any apparent purpose or aim, was pushing in all directions.

“I wonder what all this is about,” observed Mr. Punch; “suppose we ask a Policeman?”

They noticed a being attired in every respect like the familiar guardians of the peace on Earth, except that he carried a harmless and gaily-decked bladder in place of the more serviceable baton, and beckoned to him.  He approached with polite alacrity.

“You want to know what’s up, Gents?” he commenced, divining their purpose instinctively.  “It’s the Half-Quarterly Meeting of the Solid Gold Extract of Brick-Dust Company.  There’s been some little talk about the dividend not being quite so good as the prospectus led the shareholders to believe, and as the shares have been mostly taken up by widows and orphans, some of their friends, you see, are a little anxious to hear the Chairman’s Report.  But, you see, it’ll be all right.”

At this moment a widow, with blanched cheeks and dishevelled hair, who had been listening with an anxious and eager gaze to what the Policeman had been saying, joined the group.

Mr. Punch looked at her with mournful sympathy, and slowly turning the ring on his finger, addressed the Policeman.  “Tell me, my good man,” he said, persuasively, “is that the truth?  Is it really all right?”