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PHOSPHOR.
49

I could discern no roof, though I could see for a great height overhead.

The walls towered up and were lost in darkness.

More and more brilliant became the light.

At last I saw it was caused by the approach of hundreds of hideous, awful, terrible looking creatures, who, as they moved, lighted up all around them for some distance by the same peculiar phosphorescent light I had noticed emanating from the birds and fungi.

Fear took possession of me; I trembled.

I must be dreaming.

I pinched myself, and rubbed my eyes.

What were these awful monsters?

My last moments had evidently come; they would find and kill me.

When within about two hundred yards they stopped for a second or two, then going to a bed of fungi, commenced to pull it up and eat it.

While they were thus engaged, I had an opportunity to observe their strange movements and shapes.

Let me try and describe them.

In height, about half of them were five feet; the rest, not more than four.

These latter I took to be the females.

They were something like the cynocephali or baboons in general appearance.