to me," he said, "that we have got a chance at the enemies'
supplies. Suppose we begin foraging right here. Let's see if this girl
can't show us the commissary department."

He immediately began to make signs to the girl to indicate that he was
hungry.

A look of comprehension flitted over her features, and, seizing our
hands, she led us into an adjoining apartment, and pointed to a number
of metallic boxes.

One of these she opened, taking out of it a kind of cake, which she
placed between her teeth, breaking off a very small portion and then
handing it to us, motioning that we should eat, but at the same time
showing us that we ought to take only a small quantity.

"Thank God! It's compressed food," said Colonel Smith. "I thought these
Martians with their wonderful civilization would be up to that. And it's
mighty lucky for us, because, without overburdening ourselves, if we can
find one or two more caches like this we shall be able to reprovision
the entire fleet. But we must get reinforcements before we can take
possession of the fodder."

Accordingly we hurried out into the night, passed into the roadway, and,
taking the girl with us, ran as rapidly as possible to the foot of the
tree where we had made our descent. Then we signalled to the electric
ship to drop down to the level of the ground.

This was quickly done, the girl was taken aboard, and a dozen men, under
our guidance, hastened back to the house, where we loaded ourselves with
the compressed provisions and conveyed them to the ship.

On this second trip to the mysterious house we had discovered another
apartment containing a very large number of the metallic boxes, filled
with compressed food.

"By Jove, it is a storehouse," said Colonel Smith. "We must get more
force and carry it all off. Gracious, but this is a lucky night. We can
reprovision the whole fleet from this room."

"I thought it singular," I said, "that with the exception of the girl
whom we have rescued no women were seen in the house. Evidently the
lights over yonder indicate the location of a considerable town, and it
is quite probable that this building, without windows, and so strongly
constructed, is the common storehouse, where the provisions for the town
are kept. The fellows we killed must have been the watchmen in charge of
the storehouse, and they were treating themselves to a little music from
the slave girl when we happened to come upon them."

With the utmost haste