omplicated machinery would be
wanted--nothing, in fact, but a large quantity of oiled silk, a car, a
few ropes, &c., &c., and some light kind of gas, such as the antiquarians
who were acquainted with the means employed by the ancients for the
production of the lighter gases could easily instruct her workmen how to
provide. Her eagerness to see so strange a sight as the ascent of a
human being into the sky overcame any scruples of conscience that she
might have otherwise felt, and she set the antiquarians about showing her
workmen how to make the gas, and sent her maids to buy, and oil, a very
large quantity of silk (for I was determined that the balloon should be a
big one) even before she began to try and gain the King's permission;
this, however, she now set herself to do, for I had sent her word that my
prosecution was imminent.

As for myself, I need hardly say that I knew nothing about balloons; nor
did I see my way to smuggling Arowhena into the car; nevertheless,
knowing that we had no other chance of getting away from Erewhon, I drew
inspiration from the extremity in which we were placed, and made a
pattern from which the Queen's workmen were able to work successfully.
Meanwhile the Queen's carriage-builders set about making the car, and it
was with the attachments of this to the balloon that I had the greatest
difficulty; I doubt, indeed, whether I should have succeeded here, but
for the great intelligence of a foreman, who threw himself heart and soul
into the matter, and often both foresaw requirements, the necessity for
which had escaped me, and suggested the means of providing for them.

It happened that there had been a long drought, during the latter part of
which prayers had been vainly offered up in all the temples of the air
god. When I first told her Majesty that I wanted a balloon, I said my
intention was to go up into the sky and prevail upon the air god by means
of a personal interview. I own that this proposition bordered on the
idolatrous, but I have long since repented of it, and am little likely
ever to repeat the offence. Moreover the deceit, serious though it was,
will probably lead to the conversion of the whole country.

When the Queen told his Majesty of my proposal, he at first not only
ridiculed it, but was inclined to veto it. Being, however, a very
uxorious husband, he at length consented--as he eventually always did to
everything on which the Queen had set her heart. He yielded