what to do, desperately applied their electrical machinery to reverse
the attraction and threw themselves into the arms of their mother earth.

In another instant we were all free, settling down through the quiet
atmosphere with the Atlantic Ocean sparkling in the morning sun far
below.

We looked at one another in amazement. So this was the end of our
voyage! This was the completion of our warlike enterprise. We had
started out to conquer a world, and we had come back ignominiously
dragged in the train of a comet.

The earth which we were going to defend and protect had herself turned
protector, and reaching out her strong arm had snatched her foolish
children from the destruction which they had invited.

It would be impossible to describe the chagrin of every member of the
expedition.

The electric ships rapidly assembled and hovered high in the air, while
their commanders consulted about what should be done. A universal
feeling of shame almost drove them to a decision not to land upon the
surface of the planet, and if possible not to let its inhabitants know
what had occurred.

But it was too late for that. Looking carefully beneath us, we saw that
fate had brought us back to our very starting point, and signals
displayed in the neighborhood of New York indicated that we had already
been recognized. There was nothing for us then but to drop down and
explain the situation.

I shall not delay my narrative by undertaking to describe the
astonishment and the disappointment of the inhabitants of the earth
when, within a fortnight from our departure, they saw us back again,
with no laurels of victory crowning our brows.

At first they had hoped that we were returning in triumph, and we were
overwhelmed with questions the moment we had dropped within speaking
distance.

"Have you whipped them?"

"How many are lost?"

"Is there any more danger?"

"Faix, have ye got one of thim men from Mars?"

But their rejoicing and their facetiousness were turned into wailing
when the truth was imparted.

We made a short story of it, for we had not the heart to go into
details. We told of our unfortunate comrades whom we had buried upon the
moon, and there was one gleam of satisfaction when we exhibited the
wonderful crystals we had collected in the crater of Aristarchus.

Mr. Edison determined to stop only long enough to test the electrical
machinery of the cars, which had been more or less seriously deranged
during