“Then to every side of that large enclosure were fitted things like ‘shutters’ of a material impervious to the rays of the cosmic substance ‘Elekilpomagtistzen’, and these shutters, although closely fitted to the walls of the said inclosure, could yet freely slide in every direction. BTG IV

“The whole secret lay in this, that when the rays of ‘Elekilpomagtistzen’ were made to pass through this special glass, then in all the space they reached, everything usually composing the atmosphere itself of planets, such as ‘air’, every kind of ‘gas’, ‘fog’, and so on, was destroyed. This part of space became indeed absolutely empty and had neither resistance nor pressure, so that, if even an infant-being pushed this enormous structure, it would move forward as easily as a feather. BTG IV

“It cannot be gainsaid that although the ships constructed on this system were ideal in atmosphereless spaces, and moved there almost with the speed of the rays ‘Etzikolnianakhnian’ issuing from planets, yet when nearing some sun or planet it became real torture for the beings directing them, as a great deal of complicated maneuvering was necessary. BTG IV

“As I learned later, the chief particularity of this said transparent material was that although by means of the organ of sight, beings could perceive through it the visibility of every kind of cosmic concentration, yet no rays of any kind, whatever the causes they may have arisen from, could pass through it, either from within out or from without in. BTG XVIII

“And they could pass by day because during this time at the Krentonalnian position of their planet in relation to the rays of their sun, almost all the wild terrestrial beings are in the being-state called ‘sleep’, that is to say, in a state of automatic elaboration in their presences of that energy which is necessary for their ordinary existence, which elaboration of energy proceeds in them during just this time, whereas in the three-centered beings there, on the contrary, the same is elaborated only when the said sacred property is not proceeding in the atmosphere, that is, during the period of the diurnity which they call ‘night’. BTG XXII

“The first part which was named Loosochepana had a special cone-shaped pipe, the wide end of which was hermetically fitted into a frame of the sole window of that room where the experiments were made, and the other end was a small chinklike aperture with what is called a ‘collecting-disk’, passing through which what are called the rays of ‘daylight’ coming from the window were transformed into as your favorites would say, a ‘concentrated-white-ray’. BTG XL

“This slab Pirinjiel was so constructed and regulated that the colored rays falling on it were again concentrated, but this time otherwise, and, proceeding through the second crystal, also of a special form, fell on another but larger slab, also made of ivory and called ‘Polorishboorda’. BTG XL

“Through this prism contemporary terrestrial learned beings also obtain seven colored rays from the white-ray and they also fancy that through this they can learn about certain other cosmic phenomena. BTG XL

“Your contemporary favorites, however, imagine that the colored rays which they obtain by means of this child’s toy of theirs, called by them prism, are just those same ‘positive rays’ which the great scientists obtained; and according to their naïveté they think that the, as they call it, ‘spectrum’ which they obtain from the white-rays gives just that order of the arisings of the rays in which they issue from their sources. BTG XL

‘land so, thanks to these two crystals, these great learned beings obtained from the white-ray its positive colored rays and afterwards, with the help of the slab Polorishboorda which was a part of the Loosochepana, any one of these colored rays was directed to the third and principal demonstrating part of this astonishing apparatus, namely, to the Riank-Pokhortarz. BTG XL

“On the lower, smaller ball just opposite that part of the Loosochepana through which the positive colored rays had already passed, a cavity of a special form was made, into which either the whole of the said Polormedekhtian product named opium or single active elements required for the experiments were placed during the experiments. BTG XL

“This second bore, drilled halfway through, was made in such a way that the colored rays could be directed as desired either directly from the Loosochepana or reflected from the said cavity of the lower smaller ball. BTG XL

“The same result was obtained if instead of these colored rays, corresponding sound-vibrations of the strings of the Dzendvokh were directed upon this same active element. BTG XL

“‘Namely, he decided to have recourse to what are called X rays. BTG XLI

“‘The treatment with the said rays was begun. BTG XLI

“‘When my young friend had more or less calmed down after that terrible issue, and again devoted part of his time to his beloved studies and researches of the great World–laws, then, among other things, he became much interested to know why, during the treatment of the cancer by X rays there had arisen in the body of his wife those independent concentrations he had constated which usually do not develop in this disease and which during his long years of previous observations he had never noticed. BTG XLI

“‘And it began in the following way: As we were making certain experiments by means of my vibrometers and calculating the vibrations of the electric current which produces X rays in the Roentgen apparatus, we noticed that the number of vibrations of the electric current obtained by means of these Bunsen elements, all the time either increased or diminished; and because the number of vibrations in a certain length of time were most important for our elucidations during the flowing of the electric current, it then became clear to us that that kind of electric current was absolutely useless for the elucidations we required. BTG XLI