globe will become cold some day, but this cold will only operate gradually.  What will happen, then?  The temperate zones, at a more or less distant period, will not be more habitable than the polar regions now are.  Then the population of men, as well as the animals, will flow towards the latitudes which are more directly under the solar influence.  An immense emigration will take place.  Europe, Central Asia, North America, will gradually be abandoned, as well as Australasia and the lower parts of South America.  The vegetation will follow the human emigration.  The flora will retreat towards the Equator at the same time as the fauna.  The central parts of South America and Africa will be the continents chiefly inhabited.  The Laplanders and the Samoides will find the climate of the polar regions on the shores of the Mediterranean.  Who can say, that at this period, the equatorial regions will not be too small, to contain and nourish terrestrial humanity?  Now, may not provident nature, so as to give refuge to all the vegetable and animal emigration, be at present laying the foundation of a new continent under the Equator, and may she not have entrusted these insects with the construction of it?  I have often thought of all these things, my friends, and I seriously believe that the aspect of our globe will some day be completely changed; that by the raising of new continents the sea will cover the old, and that, in future ages, a Columbus will go to discover the islands of Chimborazo, of the Himalayas, or of Mont Blanc, remains of a submerged America, Asia, and Europe.  Then these new continents will become, in their turn, uninhabitable; heat will die away, as does the heat from a body when the soul has left it; and life will disappear from the globe, if not for ever, at least for a period.  Perhaps then, our spheroid will rest—­ will be left to death—­to revive some day under superior conditions!  But all that, my friends, is the secret of the Author of all things; and beginning by the work of the insects, I have perhaps let myself be carried too far, in investigating the secrets of the future.

“My dear Cyrus,” replied Spilett, “these theories are prophecies to me, and they will be accomplished some day.”

“That is the secret of God,” said the engineer.

“All that is well and good,” then said Pencroft, who had listened with all his might, “but will you tell me, captain, if Lincoln Island has been made by your insects?”

“No,” replied Harding; “it is of a purely volcanic origin.”

“Then it will disappear some day?”

“That is probable.

“I hope we won’t be here then.”

“No, don’t be uneasy, Pencroft; we shall not be here then, as we have no wish to die here, and hope to get away some time.”

“In the meantime,” replied Gideon Spilett, “let us establish ourselves here as if forever.  There is no use in doing things by halves.”