the measured reply, "then, if this Invader is not destroyed, his
predictions will be fulfilled to the letter. In other words, on the
second of May there will not be a living thing left on earth."

At three minutes past ten that evening the Tsar looked into the
eye-piece of the Greenwich Equatorial, and saw a double-winged yellow
shape floating in the centre of the field of vision. He watched it for
long minutes, listening to the soft clicking of the clockwork, which was
the only sound that broke the silence. During the afternoon he had seen
photographs of the comet taken every night that the weather made a clear
observation possible. The series tallied exactly with what he now saw.
The gradual enlargement and brightening; the ever-increasing exactness
of definition, and the separation of the nucleus from the two wings. All
that he had seen was as pitilessly inexorable as the figures which
contained the prophecy of the world's approaching doom. He rose from his
seat and said quietly, yet with a strange impressiveness:

"Gentlemen, I, for one, am satisfied and converted. What the inscrutable
decrees of Providence may or may not be, we have no right to inquire;
but whether this is a judgment from the Most High brought upon us by our
sins, or whether it is merely an ordinary cataclysm of Nature against
which we may be able to protect ourselves, does not come into the
question which is in dispute amongst us. Humanity has an unquestioned
right to preserve its existence as far as it is possible to do so. If it
is possible to arrange for another conference at Aldershot to-morrow, I
think I may say that there will be a possibility of arriving at a
reasonable basis of negotiations. And now, if it is convenient, Lord
Kitchener, I should like to get back to camp. Much has been given to me
to think about to-night, and you know we Russians have a very sound
proverb: 'Take thy thoughts to bed with thee, for the morning is wiser
than the evening.'"

"That, your Majesty, has been my favourite saying ever since I knew that
men had to think about work before they were able to do it properly." So
spoke the man who had worked for fourteen years to win one battle, and
crush a whole people at a single stroke--after which he made the best
of friends with them, and loyal subjects of his Sovereign.

They took their leave of the astronomer and his staff, and a few minutes
later the _Auriole_, still flying the flag of truce, cleared the
tree-to