s, and, moreover, as far as human science could tell,
it was a mathematical certainty. There would be no miracle, nothing of
the supernatural about it--it would happen just as certainly as the
earth would revolve on its axis; and yet how many millions of the
earth's inhabitants would believe it until with their own eyes they saw
the approaching Fate?

In time of peace perhaps he might have obtained a hearing, but who would
pause amidst the rush of the armed battalions to listen to him? How
could the calm voice of Science make itself heard among the clash and
clangour of war? The German Emperor had already laughed in his face, and
accepted his challenge with contemptuous incredulity. No doubt his staff
and all his officers would do the same. What possibility then would
there be to convince the millions who were fighting blindly under their
orders? No; it was hopeless. The war must go on. He could only hope that
the Aerial Fleet which Mr Parmenter was bringing across the Atlantic
would turn the tide of battle in favour of the defenders of Britain.

But there was another matter to be considered. Thanks to the control
possessed by the Parmenter Syndicate over the Atlantic cables and the
aerograph system of the world, he was kept daily, sometimes hourly,
acquainted with everything that was happening. He knew that the Eastern
forces of Russia were concentrating upon India in the hope that the
disasters in England and the destruction of the Fleet would realise the
old Muscovite dream of detaching the natives from their loyalty to the
British Crown and so making the work of conquest easy. In the Far East,
Japan was recovering from the exhaustion consequent upon her costly
victories over Russia, and had formed an ominous alliance with China.

On the other hand Italy, England's sole remaining ally in Europe, had
blockaded the French Mediterranean ports, and while the French legions
were being drawn northward to the conquest of Britain, the Italian
armies had seized the Alpine passes and were preparing an invasion which
should avenge the humiliations which Italy had suffered under the first
Napoleon.

In a word, everything pointed to universal war. Only the United States
preserved an inscrutable silence, which had been broken only by four
words: "Hands off our commerce." And to these the Leagued Nations had
listened, if rather by compulsion than respect.

Who was he, then, that he should, as it were, sound the trump of
approa