At 9 o’clock on the 13th of Meijh I left Sanf Rachisco and after a tedious journey of nearly fifty minutes arrived at Bolosson, the eastern terminus of the magnetic tube, on the summit of the Ultimate Hills.  According to Tucker this was anciently a station on the Central Peaceful Railway, and was called “German,” in honor of an illustrious dancing master.  Prof.  Nupper, however, says it was the ancient Nevraska, the capital of Kikago, and geographers generally have accepted that view.

Finding nothing at Bolosson to interest me except a fine view of the volcano Carlema, then in active eruption, I shouldered my electric rifle and with my case of instruments strapped upon my back plunged at once into the wilderness, down the eastern slope.  As I descended the character of the vegetation altered.  The pines of the higher altitudes gave place to oaks, these to ash, beech and maple.  To these succeeded the tamarack and such trees as affect a moist and marshy habitat; and finally, when for four months I had been steadily descending, I found myself in a primeval flora consisting mainly of giant ferns, some of them as much as twenty surindas in diameter.  They grew upon the margins of vast stagnant lakes which I was compelled to navigate by means of rude rafts made from their trunks lashed together with vines.

In the fauna of the region that I had traversed I had noted changes corresponding to those in the flora.  On the upper slope there was nothing but the mountain sheep, but I passed successively through the habitats of the bear, the deer and the horse.  This last mentioned creature, which our naturalists have believed long extinct, and which Dorbley declares our ancestors domesticated, I found in vast numbers on high table lands covered with grass upon which it feeds.  The animal answers the current description of the horse very nearly, but all that I saw were destitute of the horns, and none had the characteristic forked tail.  This member, on the contrary, is a tassel of straight wiry hair, reaching nearly to the ground—­a surprising sight.  Lower still I came upon the mastodon, the lion, the tiger, hippopotamus and alligator, all differing very little from those infesting Central Europe, as described in my “Travels in the Forgotten Continent.”

In the lake region where I now found myself, the waters abounded with ichthyosauri, and along the margins the iguanodon dragged his obscene bulk in indolent immunity.  Great flocks of pterodactyls, their bodies as large as those of oxen and their necks enormously long, clamored and fought in the air, the broad membranes of their wings making a singular musical humming, unlike anything that I had ever heard.  Between them and the ichthyosauri there was incessant battle, and I was constantly reminded of the ancient poet’s splendid and original comparison of man to

      dragons of the prime
  That tare each other in their slime.

When brought down with my electric rifle and properly roasted, the pterodactyl proved very good eating, particularly the pads of the toes.