But when the Master came back to knowledge of that present, he would
rouse and chide, and they, all those lesser ones, would fly swiftly and
guiltily to their various works; and yet, so I have thought since, each
with a muddled and bewildered and thoughtful air upon him; and hungry
they were for more, and ever wondering and setting questions about.
And so it was also with those others--those learned ones who were not of
the Tower of Observation, and who disbelieved even whilst they hungered.
Listen would they, though I talked from the first hour, which was the
"dawn," to the fifteenth hour, which was the beginning of the "night";
for the Sleep-Time was set thus, after other usage and experiment. And,
odd whiles, I found that there were among them, men of extraordinary
learning who upheld my tellings as tales of verity; and so there was a
faction; but, later, there grew more to believe; and whether they
believed, or not, all were ready to listen; so that I might have spended
my days in talk; only that I had my work to do.
But the Master Monstruwacan believed from the beginning, and was wise
always to understand; so that I loved him for this, as for many another
dear quality. And so, as may be conceived, among all those millions I was singled out
to be known; for the stories that I told went downward through a
thousand cities; and, presently, in the lowest tier of the Underground
Fields, an hundred miles deep in the earth below the Redoubt, I found
that the very ploughboys knew something concerning my tellings; and
gathered about me one time and another when the Master Monstruwacan and
I had gone down, regarding some matter that dealt with the Earth-Current
and our Instruments.
And of the Underground Fields (though in that age we called them no more
than "The Fields") I should set down a little; for they were the
mightiest work of this world; so that even the Last Redoubt was but a
small thing beside them. An hundred miles deep lay the lowest of the
Underground Fields, and was an hundred miles from side to side, every
way; and above it there were three hundred and six fields, each one less
in area than that beneath; and in this wise they tapered, until the
topmost field which lay direct beneath the lowermost floor of the Great
Redoubt, was but four miles every way.
And thus it will be seen that these fields, lying one beneath the other,
formed a mighty and incredible Pyramid of Country Lands in the deep
earth, an hundred miles from the base unto the topmost field.