g, crashing right through it, and a second later Dick and his
companions found themselves in the midst of a squealing lot of pigs,
that fairly rushed over them.

CHAPTER VIII

AT HAMILTON CORNERS

Instinctively, as he felt the airship falling, without being under
control, Dick had loosed the strap that held him to his seat. This
advice had been given as one of the first instructions, to enable the
aviator to leap clear of the craft as it struck.

But, in this case the landing had been such a queer one that there was
no time for any of the three to do the latter. Down on the roof of the
pig sty they had come, crashing through it, for the place was old and
rotten.

It was this very fact, however, that saved them from more serious
injuries than severe joltings. The roof had collapsed, had broken in
the middle, and the squealing porkers were now running wild. Most of
them seemed to prefer the vicinity of the spot near where the three
aviators were now tumbled in a heap, having been thus thrown by the
concussion.

"Get out of here, you razor-back!" cried Dick, as a pig fairly walked
over him. He managed to struggle to his feet, but another pig took
that, seemingly, as an invitation to dart between the legs of the young
millionaire, and upset him.

Dick fell directly back on the form of Captain Grantly, who grunted at
the impact. Then, as Lieutenant Larson tried to get up, he, too, was
bowled over by a rush of some more pigs.

But the two army officers, and Dick, were football players, and they
knew how to take a fall, so were not harmed. Fortunately they had been
tossed out on a grassy part of the pen, and away from the muddy slough
where the porkers were in the habit of wallowing.

"Get out, you brutes!" cried Dick, striking at the pigs with a part of
one of the pen roof boards. Then, with the army men to help him, he
succeeded in driving the swine out of their way. This done, the
aviators looked at one another and "took an account of stock."

"Are you hurt?" asked the captain of Dick, grimly.

"No, only bruised a bit. As the old lady said of the train that came
to a sudden halt because of a collision, 'do you always land this way?'"

"No, indeed!" exclaimed the captain, as he looked at the ruin of the
shed, amid which the airship was. "This is my first accident of this
kind. The lever of the vertical rudder snapped, and I couldn't control
her. Luckily the roof was rotten, or we might have sma