"Landing in ten minutes," spoke the annunciators throughout the ship. "Stasis going on."

The dim glow of the force-stasis that cushioned everything in the ship against pressure of deceleration came on like a tangible medium around them. The big propulsion-wave generators droned in lower key.

Swaddled in the cushioning force, they felt no discomfort as the "Larkoom" quickly dropped toward the little planet. Atmosphere screamed briefly outside the ship. They came down through a belt of clouds.

"That's the city New York!" cried an eager voice. "The oldest human city in the galaxy!"

CHAPTER II

Ancient Town

Carlin looked with a jaundiced eye on the scene widening out below them. There was a blue ocean stretching eastward, a long green coast, and an island that was covered by the grotesquely lofty buildings of an extremely antiquated type of city.

This ancient town called New York was like a memento of the primitive past. Not for a thousand years had men crowded their structures so crazily together, or built them to such insane heights.

"It's like one of the bird-people's lofts on Polaris One!" exclaimed a girl, laughing. "And how old it looks!"

Old? Yes. Pitifully old, like a withered beldame who endeavors still to maintain stiff dignity. The city looked only half-occupied, vines growing on some of the grotesque towers, parks ragged around the edges.

The spaceport, some distance northward amid low rolling hills, was so small as to be inadequate for any decent world. Carlin's practised eyes condemned the cracked, blackened tarmac, the ill-placed rows of docks, the insufficient hangar and repair buildings.

The "Larkoom" landed softly. Carlin waited wearily until the squealing rush of tourists was over, and then walked out into the soft yellow sunshine. He looked around without interest. Landing on a new world was no novelty to him.

But for a moment, he was startled by the air he breathed. It was so sweet, so buoyant, so right. It was subtly stimulating, exhilarating to the lungs. Then he realized the cause. All over the galaxy, the descendants of Earthmen had conditioned planetary atmospheres with this atmosphere of Earth as the desired norm.

He looked around uncertainly. The tourists were already 

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