“A disc spaceship of such gigantic proportions is undoubtedly a visitor from some inconceivably distant planet, perhaps, even, from some extragalactical world. It could have continued its journey millions of years after the death of its crew before landing on the planet of the iron star in our desert region on the fringe of the Galaxy.

“There is no need for me to enlarge on the importance of a study of that ship by a special expedition to star T.”

Grom Orme switched on the hemispherical screen and the hall disappeared. The records of the memory machines moved slowly across the screen.

“This is a recently received communication from planet CR 519,1 will omit the detailed coordinates for the sake of brevity, about their expedition to the Achernar system.”

The positions of the stars seemed peculiar and even the most experienced eye could not recognize well-known heavenly bodies. The screen showed patches of dully luminous gas, dark clouds and, lastly, huge dead planets that reflected the light of a terrifically bright star.

Achernar had a diameter only three and a half times that of our Sun but its luminosity was 280 times greater: it was an indescribably bright blue star belonging to spectral class B5. The spaceship that had made the record had travelled a long way to one side, dozens of years’ journey, perhaps.

Another star appeared on the screen, a bright green star of class S. It grew in size, became brighter and brighter as the spaceship from another world drew nearer to it. The surface of a new planet then appeared. It showed a country of high mountains clothed in every possible shade of green. Deep canyons and steep slopes were marked by dark green, almost black shadows, the gentler slopes and valleys were bathed in greens in which a blue tint predominated, the snow on the mountain tops and high plateaux was aquamarine and there were also patches of yellowish green where the sun had scorched the earth. Rivers the colour of malachite ran down slopes to lakes and seas hidden beyond the mountains.

Next came a plain dotted with round hills that stretched as far as a sea that from a distance looked like a gleaming sheet of green iron. Blue trees carried masses of dense foliage and the glades were bright with purple strips and patches of unknown bushes and grasses. Gold-green rays came in a mighty stream from the amethyst heavens. The earthlings were dazzled by the beauty of the planet. Mven Mass searched his encyclopaedic memory for the exact coordinates of the green star.

“Achernar is Alpha Eridani, it is high up in the southern sky not far from Tucana… distance — 21 parsecs… the return of a spaceship with the same crew ia impossible,” were the thoughts that flashed through his mind.

The screen was switched off and the sight of the closed hall, adapted for contemplation and conferences by Earth-dwellers, seemed suddenly strange to behold.

“That green star,” the voice of the President continued, “with an abundance of zirconium in its spectrum, is slightly larger than our Sun.” Here Grom Orme gave the coordinates of the zirconium star very rapidly.

“There are two planets in its system,” he continued. “They are twins revolving opposite each other at a distance from the star that ensures them about the same amount of energy as Earth receives from the Sun.

“The depth and composition of the atmosphere and the amount of water are similar to those of Earth. These are the preliminary data obtained by the expedition sent out from planet CR 519. The same report speaks of the absence of intelligent life on the twin planets. Higher forms of intelligent life transform nature to such an extent that it is visible even from a spaceship flying at a great height. We must assume that higher forms of life have not been able to develop or have not yet developed there. This is unusually favourable to us. If there were higher forms of life there the planets would be closed to us. In year 72 of the Great Circle Era, over seven centuries ago, our world discussed the question of settling a planet with higher forms of intelligent life even if they had not reached our level of civilization. It was then decided that any invasion of such a planet would only lead to acts of violence due to the profoundest misunderstandings.

“We now know how great is the diversity of worlds in our Galaxy. There are blue, green, yellow, white, red and orange stars; they are all of the hydrogen-helium type but their mantles and cores are of different composition — carbon, cyanogen, titanium, zirconium — and they have different kinds of radiation, high or low temperatures and atmospheres of different composition. There are planets whose volume, density, depth and composition of atmosphere and hydrosphere, distance from their sun, conditions of rotation all differ very greatly. We also know that our planet, with water covering seventy per cent of its surface in combination with its proximity to a sun that pours a tremendous amount of energy on to it, enjoys conditions favouring the development of powerful living organisms, a rich variety of biological forms that are undergoing constant transformation, a case that is not often met with in the Universe.

“Life on our planet, therefore, developed more quickly than in other worlds where it is hampered by a shortage of water or solar energy or by insufficient dry land. And more quickly, too, than on the planets that have too much water! In the Circle transmissions we have seen the evolution of life on the planets that are under water, life that is crawling desperately upwards on stems of plants sticking out of the water.

“Our planet also has large expanses of water and the area of the continents is relatively small for the accumulation of solar energy through food plants, trees or simply by means of thermoelectric installations.

“In the earliest periods of Earth’s history life developed more slowly in the swamps of the low-lying continents of the Palaeozoic Era than it did on the high land of the Cainozoic where there was a struggle for water as well as for food.

“We know that for an abundant and powerful life there must be a certain ratio of land to water and our planet is very close to the optimum in its composition. There are not many such planets in the Cosmos and every one of them is an invaluable acquisition for mankind as new land where man can settle and continue to develop.

“Man has long since ceased to fear the catastrophic over-population that at one time greatly disturbed our distant ancestors, but still we persist in our exploration of the Cosmos, extending the region settled by our people, for this, too, is progress, this, too, is an unavoidable law of development. So great are the difficulties involved in settling on a planet with physical properties differing from those of Earth that there have long been projects in existence to settle man in the Cosmos on gigantic, specially constructed installations, something like our artificial satellites magnified many times over. You will remember that an island of this type was built on the eve of the Great Circle Era, Nadir, situated more than 18 million kilometres from Earth. A small colony of people still live there but the failure of such closely confined and restricted quarters to satisfy the needs of human life if it is to spread boldly throughout the Cosmos is so obvious that we can only express amazement at our ancestors even though we admire the audacity of their engineering.

“The twin planets of the green zirconium star are very similar to ours. They are unsuitable or difficult to settle for the fragile inhabitants of planet CR 519 who discovered them and passed the information on to us in the same way as we pass our discoveries on to them.

“The green star is situated at a greater distance from our planet than any spaceship has yet covered. If we reach the planets of that star we shall have moved far out into the Universe. We shall move forward, not on the tiny world of an artificial island but on big planets where there is every opportunity for the organization of comfortable life and for mighty technical achievements.