No mortal man could
succeed, even when urged on by such a motive as mine.

"Then I determined upon another course. I worked and slaved until I
could procure another balloon, as nearly like the one I lost as might
be constructed. Then I watched and waited for just such another storm
as the one upon whose wings my darlings were borne away, meaning to take
the same course, and so find--"

"Why, man, dear, you must have been insane!" impulsively cried the
professor, unable longer to control his tongue.

"Perhaps I was; little wonder if so," admitted Edgecombe, turning that
way, with a wan smile lighting up his visage. "I could no longer reason.
I could only act. I had but that one grim hope, to eventually discover
what time and exposure to the weather might have left of my lost loves.

"Then, after so long waiting, the storm came, blowing in the same
direction as that other. I cut my balloon loose, and let it drift. I
looked and waited, hoping, longing, yet--failing! I was wrecked, here in
this wilderness. My balloon was carried away. I failed to find--aught!"

Cooper Edgecombe turned towards the air-ship, with a sigh of regret.

"If one had something like this then, I might have found them,--even
alive! But now--too late--eternally too late!"

CHAPTER XIII. THE LOST CITY OF THE AZTECS.

Uncle Phaeton was more than willing to do the honours of his pet
invention, and this afforded a most happy diversion, although the
deepening twilight hindered any very extensive examination.

Cooper Edgecombe showed himself in a vastly different light while thus
engaged, his shrewd questions, his apt comments, quite effectually
removing the far from agreeable doubts born of his earlier words and
demeanour.

"Well, if he's looney, it's only on some points, not as the whole
porker, anyway," confidentially asserted Waldo, when an opportunity
offered. "Coax him to tell how he knocked the redskin out, uncle
Phaeton."

Little need of recalling that perplexing incident to the worthy savant,
for, try as he might, Featherwit could not keep from brooding over that
wondrous collection of relics pertaining to a long-since extinct people.
Of course, the last one had perished ages ago; and yet--and yet--

Through his half-bewildered brain flashed the accounts given by
the coast tribes, members of which he had so frequently interviewed
concerning this unknown land, one and all of whom had more or less to
say in regard to a strange people