Dominic AllenPanelist
At first the constellations had shone motionless against the black background of infinite space.

but presently it seemed as though the group of stars about Hercules and the scorpion was contracting, while Orion and Aldebaran and their neighbours were scattering apart.

Flashing suddenly out of the darkness, there came a flying multitude of particles of rock, glittering like dust specks in a sunbeam, and encompassed in a faintly luminous cloud.

And then I saw that a bright spot of light that shone a little to one side of my path was growing very rapidly larger, and perceived that it was the planet Saturn rushing towards me.

Larger and larger it grew, swallowing up the heavens behind it and hiding every moment a fresh multitude of stars.

I perceived its flattened, whirling body, its disk-like belt, and seven of its little satellites.

It grew and grew, till it towered enormous, and then I plunged amid a screaming multitude of clashing stones and dancing dust particles and gas eddies, and saw for a moment the mighty triple belt, like three concentric arches of moonlight above me, its shadow black on the boiling tumult below.
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At first the constellations had shone motionless against the black background of infinite space.

but presently it seemed as though the group of stars about Hercules and the scorpion was contracting, while Orion and Aldebaran and their neighbours were scattering apart.

Flashing suddenly out of the darkness, there came a flying multitude of particles of rock, glittering like dust specks in a sunbeam, and encompassed in a faintly luminous cloud.

And then I saw that a bright spot of light that shone a little to one side of my path was growing very rapidly larger, and perceived that it was the planet Saturn rushing towards me.

Larger and larger it grew, swallowing up the heavens behind it and hiding every moment a fresh multitude of stars.

I perceived its flattened, whirling body, its disk-like belt, and seven of its little satellites.

It grew and grew, till it towered enormous, and then I plunged amid a screaming multitude of clashing stones and dancing dust particles and gas eddies, and saw for a moment the mighty triple belt, like three concentric arches of moonlight above me, its shadow black on the boiling tumult below.