The Camargo Comet. (Camargo, Okla.), Vol. 7, No. 4, Ed. 1 Friday, May 31, 1918 Page: 5 of 8
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THE CAMARGO COMET
We
Deep Sea
Peril
VICTOR ROUSSEAU
A
OOrTBlOBT BY WSOHAPMAB
CHAPTER I X— Continued
—11—
Donald tnrned and began skirting
the crtnold bed The sea devil had
disappeared The water was like a
thin unstable Jelly Aa they made
their way along the bottom of the aea
the fleshy Illy arms reached out
toward them like children's plucking
Angers At last the bed of crinolda
ended They trod on firmer ground
Their pace became accelerated
He had lost all sense of time He
did not know whether be had Jour-
neyed one hour or three He halted
because there seemed nothing to do
Then he began to lead the way back
between the two ctinold beds with the
Intention of reaching the dear ground
near the entrance to the cave
There there might be a chance of
picking up Davies and Clouts or at
least It might be possible from there
to return to the submarine with Ida
to replenish their oxygen reservoirs
These still seemed ample but It was
Impossible to determine how much
oxygen remained
They threaded the mases of the
winding path between the beds while
from either side the fleshy arms
stretched out to grapple them The
touch of them was like fiery velvet
The suction of the branches made
them cling and Donald had to exercise
all his might to break away Some-
times their ankles became entangled
and they would stumble Always the
arms bad formed a network above
their heads before they could regain
their feet and these had to be broken
Under their feet the ooze was white
with the skeletons of small fish which
the lilies had rejected after devouring
the substnnce that covered them
At length the ctinold beds ended
' abruptly They rested on the bottom
seating themselves side by side Don-
ald felt confident that he could find the
submarine But the delay was sweet
because the dlsappolr'roent In store
for them might prove unbearable
Death or a little life would be the al-
ternative and the difference was hard-
ly perceptible
Donald raised Ida’s hand to his glass
mask and pressed the fingers against
It
She let her hand fall caressingly
upon his shoulders She rose to her
feet and he followed her They looked
Into each other’s eyes and though
they could read nothing there some
message of hope seemed to pass
They plunged together Into the sea
of Jelly again It clung to them as
If It too sought to suck them down
The light of the electric lamps was
growing obscure They wandered blind-
ly struggling In a medium that was
almost Impermeable
Donald began to realize that the ac-
tion of the caustic alkali within the
metallic chamber was becoming ex-
hausted He was beginning to choka
Uls breath came In deep sighs and he
gulped In the thickening atmosphere
Their steps grew slower Ida could
hardly raise her feet Once she stum-
bled and fell picked herself up and
started beside Donald again then she
sank down exhausted She could not
go farther
Death horrible In form awaited
them It was becoming Imminent
Donald was growing delirious and In
fancy he was strolling with Ida
through meadows plucking flowers
They were to be married on the mor-
row and be was going to get leave of
absence to take her away Where
should they spend their honeymoon!
Off the coast of the 8hetlanda Why
he had been there once long before—
AU the while he was aware that he
was lying on the bed of the sea but
his personality seemed divided and
while one part of him walked in those
Elyslan fields beside his sweetheart
the other suffered and choked and
pleaded lmpotently with a blind fate
for aid— not for his life's sake but
for Ida’s
The girl's hand was unresponsive In
his own Perhaps she was dead al-
ready Donald chafed It but was
hardly able to distinguish It In that
Jellylike environment which was
thickening perceptibly now
The lingers were limp and cold
They were both numbed from the ex-
posure— and Ida was dead He would
follow her then
Slowly and with deliberation he un-
fastened the copper cylinder fro pi
about his body At once the little
electric light went out It had grown
so dim Unit only then did Donald re-IncfiilM-r
that It hml been burning
II" imniKi l'il the headpiece and
took off the mask of glass He flung
It from him A moment he held his
breath as he felt the cool water-jelly
upon his face Then very resolutely
he drew In his breath
CHAPTER X
The Cave of the Idol
A cry of amazement burst from his
Ups He was breathing air — air at the
bottom of the seal
It was surcharged with oxygen It
Invigorated him He felt the thrill
of renewed life In his body he felt
his shrunken arteries tingle as his
heart pumped the new rlchened blood
through them
It seemed unbelievable At first he
thought that he had died and that this
was the soul’s awakening
Then with quick fingers he unfas-
tened Ida’s body-piece and tore the
mask from its fastenings He heard
her sigh
She sighed and stirred and sat up
on the ocean bed
"Donald I” she murmured "I
thought — I thought you were dead
Where are we 7"
"I don’t know" he answered In ab-
solute bewilderment
At that moment he heard the mel-
low gonglike sound that they bad
heard aboard the F55
And slowly as If In answer to the
call the Jellyllke medium that sur-
rounded them began to drift away to
be hung up as If it were a curtain
and before their astonished gaze there
evolved the strangest stage setting
that could ever have been conceived
First there came Into view the sub-
marine occupying as It were the cen-
ter of this stage her bow sunk In the
ooze her stern still lower They had
been lying within a hundred paces of
her
Next appeared the sloping edges of
the crater seen not through water but
through clear air with a border of
yellow crinolds ceaselessly stirring
as though a breeze ruffled them Then
there began to be visible In the flanks
of the mountain structures appar-
ently of hardened mud taking the
shape of fnntastlc temples with pil-
lars and doorways with low lintels a
submerged city of cliff dwellers and
yet each Identical with Its neighbors
so that they seemed to have been fash-
ioned with the same unchanging pre-
cision as the cells of the bee
And the whole crater swarmed with
the sea-monsters no longer Invisible
but outlined In phosphorescent fire
And standing In front of Donald
and Ida his features clearly visible
through the glass of his own diving
mask surveying them with a cool dis-
passionate gaze was Ira MacBeard 1
As they stared at him he raised his
band and struck something suspended
from his neck giving out the mellow
sound which they had heard before
Immediately be disappeared from view
In the midst of a swarm of the mon-
sters which surrounding Donald and
the girl began to push them toward
the cavern In the mountain side
The push was gradual and appar-
ently the result of some natural qual-
ity not known on land There was no
sense of muscular movement It
seemed to be momentum devoid of the
accompanying factor of speed Irre-
sistibly and yet quietly the two were
pushed toward the entrance In the
flank of the Island
In vain Donald resisted In vain he
tried to force a path toward the sub-
marine dashing his fists against the
bodies of the monsters ne made not
the least Impression upon those half-
spherical forms
A sea-man under water and one In
the air had very different powers of
resistance He might as well have
fought an army of animated feather-
beds Slowly without strain or attack he
felt himself being forced forward He
was held tightly on every side except
for the narrow gap that opened la
front of him He was forced to devote
himself to supporting Ida
On every side the globular trans-
lucent phosphorescent forms seemed
to crowd In on him leaving only a
tiny way In the direction of one of
the mud-pillared entrances Yet even
thus Donald had the Impression of
some unconscious force that animated
these monsters It seemed like the
scouting expedition of a colony of red
ants returning with Its booty He
could sense no conscious Impulse In
the sea monsters
His pace became accelerated and
suddenly swept off their feet Donald
and Ida found themselves within a
huge cavern faintly Illumined by phos-
phorescence and roofed with the same
cloudy substance that they -had seen
upon the ocean bed without
The monsters left them The two
stood there togethor still In bewil-
derment But they were not alone
for with a about Davies emerged
from the dim recess and ran toward
them followed by Clouts Their cyl-
inders and headgear had been re-
moved The four stared at one an-
other In Incredulous Joy
"They nabbed us the moment we
left the air-lock" cried Davies grab-
bing the lieutenant by the hand and
forgetting his discipline for the first
time "And Clouts too They sort
of edged us In here Wo wefj gtrnld
you were dead"
"They gave us a little longer res-
pite" answered Donald "Davies am
mad or dreaming or are we breath-
ing under water T"
"If you’re dreaming then Clouts
and I are too” said the little middy
"Hello I There Clouts goes again I
I’ve tried to keep him resigned but
he gets frantic occasionally"
With a sudden howl that seemed to
rise from the depths of an outraged
nature Clouts lowering his head
rushed like a battering ram Into the
doorway The watchers saw him re-
coil aa if he had butted a feather bed
He looked up rubbed his head In per-
plexity and then retiring a few
paces repeated his experiment more
furiously than before
Again be was burled back as a ball
rebounds from the cushion of a bil-
liard table The monsters' bodies
blocked the entrance as effectively
as If they were of rubber
Slowly Sam Clouts withdrew look-
ing back with a puzzled expression
Meanwhile the three glanced about
They were In a huge natural cave
In which the sea monsters bad evi-
deiffly been at work for the Interior
was coated with mud hardened in
some peculiar manner to resist the
water And yet Donald had the same
Impression of a beehive There was
something of sameness everywhere
the same sense of automatism
It was quite bare except at one
end where arose a mud mound deco-
rated with seashells and upon this
was what looked like the upright
skeleton of a small mammal
"Look 1" exclaimed Donald
"It came from — from behind the
curtain 1" said Davies In awe "Don-
ald the air was thicker some-
thing keeps rolling back 7”
They looked at each other still un-
convinced that they were awake and
alive Then they went toward the ob-
ject at the end
Sam Clouts who had preceded
them fell back with an exclamation
of horror
"Yes Clouts!" said Donald
"I beg your pardon sir but don't
you see that It's meant to be a per-
son sir!”
lie spoke the truth The figure was
rough pile of bones but high above
them a grinning human face made of
the same plastered mud looked down
It was the first sign of conscious
process among the monsters and
"Leekl" Exclaimed Donald
some devil craftsman had contrived
to catch not so much the form as the
humanness of It
It was upon a larger scale precisely
such a figure as a child or a savage
might have made In Its first efforts to
reproduce the human figure There
were even the dawnlnga of art In the
shape of whales’ ear-bones strung
braceletwlse across the breast
The mound beneath the figure con-
sisted of Innumerable bones a sort of
kitchen midden such as Neolithic man
left behind him as a testimony to his
oyster feasts
Davies picked up one of the bones
and looked at It Intently
"Donald I" he said softly not to at-
tract the attention of Ida who seated
on the floor against the mound seemed
on the point of falling asleep from
weariness He held out the bone
Both looked at It It was the bone
of a flipper beet The monsters were
cannibal beyond any doubt
"Davies I" cried Donald a moment
later "Don’t you see what that figure
Is! It’s an IdoL And the bones are
those of creatures of their own spe-
cies and others sacrificed to It by the
monsters In their abominable feasts
It's the first dawnlngs of self-con-ectousnesa
the awakening of the
llglous perceptional"
There could be no other Interpre-
tation They looked at each other In
horror and something of awe
The thing had been fashioned per-
haps after an Ideal never seen or per-
chance some forgotten ancestor cast
up on an Inhabited shore had seen
man and returned to embody him In
his remembered guise
Bo these half-blind and voiceless
derU of the tea were poping alowlv
upward as of ancestors ha£ dona
many a hundred thousand years ago
toward hope and endeavor The Spirit
of Ood stirred In the dull souls of
these cannibal monsters as every-
where Donald felt somehow Immensely
elated at the thought Even here they
were not cut off from the sheltering
hand of Providence
"Look air!” Clouts exclaimed su&
denly
(TO BE CONTINUED)
GROW POTATOES FROM SEED
Experts of ’University of Washington
Use White Fruiting Berry Which
Has Almost Disappeared
In an effort to restore the old-fashioned
potato seed an experiment la
being made In the garden of the Uni-
versity of Washington The white
fruiting berry of the potato which was
found everywhere a generation ago
and has now almost disappeared was
used to plant a patch and the fruit-
ing potato plants are being raised
With them have been planted a num-
ber of potato tubers In the usual way
and the latter have grown much more
rapidly than the plants which have
developed from the seeds The object
In peeking to produce potato seed
again la that crossing of strains can
be secured In this way leading to a
more wholesome condition of the plant
When propagation la only by the roots
there Is no chance for cross-fertilization
and the same strain of potato
will In time give out
The experiment Is being conducted
under the direction of Assistant Prof
John W Hotson of the department of
botany
Proved Ha Was a Driver
"I left England a political slave
shall return to It a free woman'
remarked Mrs Pankhurst recently at
meeting of Russian Suffragists
"But” she continued gravely “It la
not the possession of the vote that
counts It Is the knowing how to use
It” And In order to Illustrate her
contention she proceeded to tell the
story of the pedestrian who had nearly
been run over by a taxi
“You don’t know how to drivel”
cried the angry man as he brushed the
mud from his clothes
“Don’t I!” cried the no leas Infuri-
ated driver "Here’s my driver’s cer-
tificate” "I don't believe It’s yours" was the
retort
"Not mlnel" gasped the Indignant
driver “Why I bought It from a pal
who's gone Into the army and paid
him for It”
Self-Confidence Wins
Have you ever felt the chagrin of
knowing that you have failed In an en-
terprise whether this may have been
a mere incident of business or an en-
tire career purely through lack of self-
confidence! Thousands of men have failed In Just
that way writes Hugo Masters In Phy-
sical Culture
Self-confidence Is a factor In success
of such Importance that the man with
moderate ability but plenty of confi-
dence will succeed where the man of
far greater ability coupled with a lack
of confidence will fall This has been
proven probably a few billion times la
the history of human affairs
He Picked Up a Living
Sir John Kirk who recently cele-
brated his fiftieth anniversary of work
in connection with the Bagged School
union tells an amusing anecdote of
how he once questioned a London wait
whom he had befriended as to his
method of earning a living
The young fellow’s reply was typical
of the London street arab
"Well guv’nor” he said "It's like
this I picks strawberries In the sum-
mer I picks 'ops In the autumn In
the winter I picks pockets and as a
rule Pm pickin’ oakum for the rest of
the year"
Argentina Gum In Demand
Among the Argentine Industries
which have benefited because of the
suspended Importation resulting from
the European war that of pitch gum Is
found to be of Importance The pitch
gum of Argentina Is sold under the
name of Arabic gum and la used In
tbe manufacture of candles This
product Is now being used extensively
Instead of the Imported article and ef-
forts are being made to exploit Its
cultivation and production
Manifold Uses for Cotton
In calling attention to the manifold
uses for cotton cotton seed and cotton-
seed oil the Boston Herald mentions
the following products: Photographic
films automobile windows buttons
"Ivory" artificial silk combe knife
handles trunks book bindings shoes
furniture headwear handbags lard
soap buttertne paints rubber guncot-
ton and smokeless powder used In ex-
plosives Wife Failed to Keep Her Weed
Hoyle— Doyle la suing his wife tor
9 of promise
Boyle— roe breach of promise!
Hoyle— Yee she promised to divorce
him hat now she has backed eutH-
Town Topics
iiCREASE III WESTER!)
CANADA LAUD VALUES'
But Forty and Fifty Bushels ol
Wheat to the Acre
During tbe past year there has been
greater demand for farm lands la
Western Canada than for a number ol
years past Tbe demand Is for good
farm lands Improved or unimproved
And at an Increase of from ten to flf-j
teen dollars an acre more than thej
same lands could be had for a couple!
of years ago
Tbe rise In the price of every kind!
of produce grown on these Westernj
lands In some cases to double and
others to treble the price prevailing
fore 1014 have attracted and are at-
tracting In ever-increasing proportions!
the men who are anxious to Invest
their money and apply their energies!
In the production of wheat for whlchl
the allied nations are calling with!
voices which grow louder and morel
anxious as tbe months roll on and
end of the war still seems dlatan
Beef and more especially bacon
required In ever greater quantities
and the price of all these things ban
soared until It Is not a question ofi
what shall we produce but how muchj
can we produce Even should this
world calamity be brought to a close
In six months from now It will ba
years before normal pre-war priced
prevail and meantime self-interest la
not patriotism is turning the minds ofi
thousands back to the land The In-
evitable consequence has been the rl
In values of land especially whea
land
The Calgary Herald commenting oaj
these conditions says :
"From Inquiries made from leading!
dealers In farming and ranching pro pi
erties aid from the information gath-
ered In other ways It la known thah
the value of all land — wheat landj
mixed farming properties and even!
good grazing land — has risen In the
last two years 40 per cent Wheafl
lands In some districts have practical-
ly doubled In price One dealer In
farm lands recently sold three sections
for (70 an acre one extra good quar-
ter went as high as 190 and another
brought $100 These are of course
large prices but that they will bo
equaled or even surpassed In the near
future Is beyond queation There Is a!
feature about this rush to the land
from which the most solid hope can
be drawn for the success of the move-1
ment The proper tillage of land tot
produce large crops In a climate Ilk
ours is now understood and practiced!
as It never was In the early days ofi
the province It would seem too that!
with the Increase of land under cults
vatlon the seasons are changing
and the rainfall becoming greater and
more regular
"Crops are being harvested especial-
ty In Southern Alberta which would
have seemed Impossible to the old-time-fanner
with his old-fashioned Ideas
of breaking and seeding And at the
price now set by the government for
wheat and which possibly may be In-
creased during the coming season the
return to the practical skilled agricul-
turtst must necessarily be very large 1
"What matters $10 or even $20 an
acre extra on wheat land when a re-
turn as high as DO bushels and even
more may be taken from every acre
sown! With hogs bringing $20 a hun-
dred pounds beef on the hoof at $12
and mutton $10 while wool under the
new government arranged system of
handling and sale brings 65 cents e
pound (and these values cannot fall
to any great extent for some years)
the demand for land will continue and
values Increase In a corresponding do
gree
"There has never been In the hlstorw
of Canada a time so favorable for thti
farmer as the present self-interest
the Inspiration of patriotic feeling the
aid freely extended by the governs
ment who are permitting the Import
of certain agricultural Implements
tree all these tend to still fnrthea
raise the price of Alberta land" — Ad-
vertisement Taste and Smell
Since the sense organa the taste an$
amell buds are sunk la tba moist mu-
cous membrane they can only bq
touched by substance somewhat eol-
nbla In water and to reach tha aeoaq
of smell they most also be volatile eq
aa to bo diffused in tbs nlr lnhalsd h
tbs nose Tha "tasto” of food la most
ly da to tho volatils odors of It tha$
ersep np tho backstairs Into tha olfiao
tory chamber
A chemist given an unknown su!m
stance would have to maka aa ele-
mentary analysis and soma tedlouq
teats to determine whether It waa a$
aldehyde or an ester whether the cars
stoma were singly or doubly
linked and whether It waa an opeq
chain or dosed But let him get
whiff of It and he can give Instantly i
pretty shrewd guess as to these points
The foe will Sad It hard to mahq
"victor Iona peace" for a nation whose
heat man are dead 1
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Cain, R. F. The Camargo Comet. (Camargo, Okla.), Vol. 7, No. 4, Ed. 1 Friday, May 31, 1918, newspaper, May 31, 1918; (https://gateway.okhistory.org/ark:/67531/metadc2029840/m1/5/: accessed June 1, 2024), The Gateway to Oklahoma History, https://gateway.okhistory.org; crediting Oklahoma Historical Society.