with an incontestable fact: namely, that Bill Jones had emerged from his fiery baptism endowed with the thought-expressing facilities of Professor Ralston, while the professor was forced to struggle along with the meager educational appliances of Bill Jones!
In this ironic manner the Space-Wanderer had left unquestionable proof of his visit by rendering a tribute to "innate intelligence" and playing a Jovian Jest upon an educated fool—a neat transposition.
A Columbus from a vaster, kindlier universe had paused for a moment to learn the story of our pigmy system. He had brought us a message from the outermost citadels of life and had flashed out again on his aeonic voyage from everlasting unto everlasting.
FOR VACATION ADVENTURERS
Truth is stranger than fiction. Ask the Regular Army man who has soldiered in the far-off corners of the earth, gone "over the top" in action, and has experienced the thrill of service in the tropics or the sub-arctic.
Better yet, get an earful of real Astounding Stories yourself, at first hand this summer, as one of the thirty thousand young men between the ages of seventeen and twenty-four enjoying those thirty glorious days and nights as a student-camper at one of Uncle Sam’s Citizens’ Military Training Camps.
All of these Camps are pitched at Regular Army posts, and it is the custom for grizzled old-timers who have followed the Flag for many long years to drift down to "the boys" around campfire time each night and regale the student campers with thrilling, real life yarns of action and adventure in many strange and unusual circumstances.
It is not necessary for one to be a rich man’s son in order to enjoy the manifold benefits of their Camps. Uncle Sam pays all the necessary bills including transportation, the best of food, bedding, laundry service and medical treatment if needed. And there is no obligation for future military service entailed by attendance at any of these Nation-wide CMT camps. Their primary mission is the upbuilding of American youth in health and good citizenship.
Detailed information, together with illustrated literature about the Citizens’ Military Training Camp, may be obtained by addressing the CMTC Officer at the U.S. Army post nearest your home.
Dream World
by R. A. Lafferty
It was the awfullest dream in the world, no doubt about it. In fact, it seemed to be the only dream there was!
He was a morning type, so it was unusual that he should feel depressed in the morning. He tried to account for it, and could not.
He was a healthy man, so he ate a healthy breakfast. He was not too depressed for that. And he listened unconsciously to the dark girl with the musical voice. Often she ate at Cahill’s in the mornings with her girl friend.
Grape juice, pineapple juice, orange juice, apple juice ... why did people look at him suspiciously just because he took four or five sorts of juice for breakfast?
*
"Agnes, it was ghastly. I was built like a sack. A sackful of skunk cabbage, I swear. And I was a green-brown color and had hair like a latrine mop. Agnes, I was sick with misery. It just isn’t possible for anybody to feel so low. I can’t shake it at all. And the whole world was like the underside of a log. It wasn’t that, though. It wasn’t just one bunch of things. It was everything. It was a world where things just weren’t worth living. I can’t come out of it...."
"Teresa, it was only a dream."
*
Sausage, only four little links for an order. Did people think he was a glutton because he had four orders of sausage? It didn’t seem like very much.
"My mother was a monster. She was a wart-hoggish animal. And yet she was still recognizable. How could my mother look like a wart-hog and still look like my mother? Mama’s pretty!"
"Teresa, it was only a dream. Forget it."
*
The stares a man must suffer just to get a dozen pancakes on his plate! What was the matter with people who called four pancakes a tall stack? And what was odd about ordering a quarter of a pound of butter? It was better than having twenty of those little pats each on its coaster.
*
"Agnes, we all of us had eyes that bugged out. And we stank! We were bloated, and all the time it rained a dirty green rain that smelled like a four letter word. Good grief, girl! We had hair all over us where we weren’t warts. And we talked like cracked crows. We had crawlers. I itch just from thinking about it. And the dirty parts of the dream I won’t even tell you. I’ve never felt so blue in my life. I just don’t know how I’ll make the day through."
"Teresa, doll, how could a dream upset you so much?"
*
There isn’t a thing wrong with ordering three eggs sunny-side up, and three over easy, and three poached ever so soft, and six of them scrambled. What law says a man should have all of his eggs fixed alike? Nor is there anything wrong with ordering five cups of coffee. That way the girl doesn’t have to keep running over with refills.
Bascomb Swicegood liked to have bacon and waffles after the egg interlude and the earlier courses. But he was nearly at the end of his breakfast when he jumped up.
"What did she say?"
He was surprised at the violence of his own voice.
"What did who say, Mr. Swicegood?"
"The girl that was just here, that just left with the other girl."
"That was Teresa, and the other girl was Agnes. Or else that was Agnes and the other girl was Teresa. It depends on which girl you mean. I don’t know what either of them said."
Bascomb ran out into the street.
"Girl, the girl who said it rained dirty green all the time, what’s your name?"
"My name is Teresa. You’ve met me four times. Every morning you look like you never saw me before."
"I’m Agnes," said Agnes.
"What did you mean it rained dirty green all the time? Tell me all about it."
"I will not, Mr. Swicegood. I was just telling a dream I had to Agnes. It isn’t any of your business."
"Well, I have to hear all of it. Tell me everything you dreamed."
"I will not. It was a dirty dream. It isn’t any of your business. If you weren’t a friend of my Uncle Ed Kelly, I’d call a policeman for your bothering me."
"Did you have things like live rats in your stomach to digest for you? Did they—"
"Oh! How did you know? Get away from me. I will call a policeman. Mr. McCarty, this man is annoying me."
"The devil he is, Miss Ananias. Old Bascomb just doesn’t have it in him any more. There’s no more harm in him than a lamp post."
"Did the lamp posts have hair on them, Miss Teresa? Did they pant and swell and smell green—"
"Oh!
