glass

Winter closed early over the great desert of the Northwest, and the first dense snow lay on the banks and covered dark trees with a white mantle. Ice formed under the river banks, and its huge layers crumbled under the sound of a choking stern wheel and rattled like broken glass on a track. In the snowy forest thickets, neither human dwellings nor living creatures were visible. The still air was bitter...

„As the great ’plane roared through the upper air, young Monty Vince sat with his eyes glued to the thick glass window of her enclosed body, and watched the sea of clouds lying like a pearly floor far below. Every nerve in his body tingled with excitement and triumph, for even he, small as was his experience, knew that this first flight of his brother’s new machine was a magnificent success”.

The bottom of the gorge was filled with old lava, black and fragile, like bottle glass, but the rocks that endlessly rose on both sides on an African night were made of limestone. Everything was still like death. Even the jackal did not cry under the stars. For a while no sound was heard except for the gentle shuffling of Nick’s legs as he slowly descended the steep slope. The darkness was terribly...