ying to shoot back at them. You remember what happened
to poor Beresford and the rest of his fleet in Dover Harbour. If you
can't hit back, you can't fight."

"That certainly appears to be perfectly reasonable," said Sir Henry
Campbell-Bannerman. "Personally, I must confess, although with the
greatest reluctance, that considering the enormous advantage possessed
by the enemy in this combination of submarine and flying machine, we
have no other alternative but to surrender at discretion. It is a
pitiful thing to say, I am well aware, but we are fighting forces which
would never have been called into being in any other war. I agree with
Lord Kitchener that you cannot fight an enemy if you cannot hit him
back. I am afraid there is no other alternative."

"No," added Lord Whittinghame, "I am afraid there is not. By to-morrow
morning there will be three millions of men on British soil, and we
haven't a million to put against them--to say nothing of these horrible
airships: but, Mr Lennard, if the world is only going to live about six
months or so, what is the use of conquering the British Empire? Surely
there must be another alternative."

"Yes, my lord," replied Lennard, "there is another. I've no doubt your
lordship has one of your motors within call. Let us go down to
Canterbury, yourself, Lord Kitchener and myself, and I will see if I
can't convince the German Emperor that in trying to conquer Britain he
is only stabbing the waters. If I only had him at Whernside, I would
convince him in five minutes."

"Then we'd better get hold of him and take him there," said Lord
Kitchener. "But I'm ready for the Canterbury journey."

"And so am I," said Lord Whittinghame, "and the sooner we're off the
better. I've got a new Napier here that's good for seventy-five miles an
hour, so we'd better be off."

CHAPTER XXVII

LENNARD'S ULTIMATUM

Within five minutes they were seated in the big Napier, with ninety
horse-power under them, and a possibility of eighty miles an hour before
them. A white flag was fastened to a little flagstaff on the left-hand
side. They put on their goggles and overcoats, and took Westminster
Bridge, as it seemed, in a leap. Rochester was reached in twenty-five
minutes, but at the southern side of Rochester Bridge they were held up
by German sentries.

"Not a pleasant sort of thing on English soil," growled Lord Kitchener
as Lord Whittinghame stopped the motor.

"Is the German Emperor here y