"Thought once you'd have done it; but I've got a little out
of training lately and run up half a stun. Now I must see what I can do
with you."

First of all he tore off some slips of paper and threw them out. Josiah
looked at them with hungry eyes. Round and round they spun, falling back
into the car or dropping to the world beyond the clouds. There was no
hope of movement for the balloon.

"Well, Mr. Smith, it's your turn now. I must see what I can do. It's not
nice for either of us, but it would be no nicer to stay here and be
starved to death or blown out to sea. You won't feel anything after the
first rush. Good-bye. I am sorry there will be no opportunity of my
communicating with you as to the result of this interesting experiment.
I don't suppose," the captain added, his love of scientific research
increasing his unfeigned regret for the inconvenience Josiah was about
to suffer, "that ever before ten stun was dropped out of a car in a
lump. I reckon I'll get as high as most people have been. Now, if you've
any message, just hand it over. If I can do anything for you in King
Street or anywhere else, you may depend upon me."

"No," said Josiah, gulping down a rising sob; "if you will only say I
went off bravely and didn't flinch, that will be all. Perhaps you might
write a few lines by way of preface to 'Underground England,' pointing
out that I died in the interests of science."

"Certainly, my dear fellow, it shall be done," said the captain, with
quite a glow of honest energy. "If you'd like a little monument or
anything of that sort, I'll see it's run up. Now, over you go. Time's
getting on, and I don't want to miss the Paris train. Give us a shake of
your paw, then shut your eyes, for I fancy I shan't have much difficulty
with you. Heave your watch over or take it with you!"

"If you wouldn't mind accepting it," said Josiah, pulling out his fine
old turnip-shaped time-piece, "as a memento of our friendship--which,
though brief, has I trust been sincere--it would give me great
pleasure."

"Certainly," said the captain, weighing it in his hand critically, and
thinking to himself that it might serve as ballast in a last emergency.
"I'll hang it over my bed, and will think of you whenever it ticks.
Nothing more to say?"

"No," said Josiah; "only, please to drop me feet first."

The captain took him in his arms as if he were a child, held him for a
moment over the side of the car, and with a cheery farewel