A Princess of Mars

As I proceeded on my journey toward Zodanga many strange and

interesting sights arrested my attention, and at the several farm

houses where I stopped I learned a number of new and instructive things

concerning the methods and manners of Barsoom.

The water which supplies the farms of Mars is collected in immense

underground reservoirs at either pole from the melting ice caps, and

pumped through long conduits to the various populated centers. Along

either side of these conduits, and extending their entire length, lie

the cultivated districts. These are divided into tracts of about the

same size, each tract being under the supervision of one or more

government officers.

Instead of flooding the surface of the fields, and thus wasting immense

quantities of water by evaporation, the precious liquid is carried

underground through a vast network of small pipes directly to the roots

of the vegetation. The crops upon Mars are always uniform, for there

are no droughts, no rains, no high winds, and no insects, or destroying

birds.

On this trip I tasted the first meat I had eaten since leaving

Earth--large, juicy steaks and chops from the well-fed domestic animals

of the farms. Also I enjoyed luscious fruits and vegetables, but not a

single article of food which was exactly similar to anything on Earth.

Every plant and flower and vegetable and animal has been so refined by

ages of careful, scientific cultivation and breeding that the like of

them on Earth dwindled into pale, gray, characterless nothingness by

comparison.

At a second stop I met some highly cultivated people of the noble class

and while in conversation we chanced to speak of Helium. One of the

older men had been there on a diplomatic mission several years before

and spoke with regret of the conditions which seemed destined ever to

keep these two countries at war.

"Helium," he said, "rightly boasts the most beautiful women of Barsoom,

and of all her treasures the wondrous daughter of Mors Kajak, Dejah

Thoris, is the most exquisite flower.

"Why," he added, "the people really worship the ground she walks upon

and since her loss on that ill-starred expedition all Helium has been

draped in mourning.

"That our ruler should have attacked the disabled fleet as it was

returning to Helium was but another of his awful blunders which I fear

will sooner or later compel Zodanga to elevate a wiser man to his

place."

"Even now, though our victorious armies are surrounding Helium, the

people of Zodanga are voicing their displeasure, for the war is not a

popular one, since it is not based on right or justice. Our forces

took advantage of the absence of the principal fleet of Helium on their

search for the princess, and so we have been able easily to reduce the

city to a sorry plight. It is said she will fall within the next few

passages of the further moon."