The Wreck of the South Pole and Other Strange Tales — page 25: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

18 The Wreck of the South Pole. After five days of travel over the snow, I thought I could notice a change in the atmosphere for the warmer, and in a couple of days more saw unmistakable evidences of a change of climate. By and by the snow and ice dis- appeared and bushes sprang up just as I had found them doing in going south when exploring the north polar zone, and coming down the shores of Alaska. And at regular intervals, during all this journey, I found huts furnished with a bed, a fire, provisions, and the usual placard. One morning, after I had been traveling over ground, instead of ice, for several days, a startling thing happened tome. I had found my cabin, as usual, eaten and slept in it. But in the morning, after breakfast, I was astonished to see a small slip of paper lying on the table, where I had eaten a few minutes before. I was quite certain it was not there while I ate, as I had sat at the table for quite a while. Who, then, could have placed it there? So far in my journey I had met no one, neither had I seen any evidence of human beings. I opened the paper and found it was a note, saying: “At your next station you will meet a guide who will conduct you to the city.” Very kind and hospitable of them, I thought to myself. And from the wording of the note and the placards on the cabin walls no doubt they are civilized. The information that another day’s journey would bring me, if not to the end of my travels, yet at least to the be- sinning of the end, and that I would meet with human EORNIELOOOLES (E(o) A