stiny of mankind for generations
to come. The hour of the Revolution has struck at last"--

"And therefore it is time that the Angel of the Revolution should
give the last signal with her own hand!" said Arnold, seized with a
sudden fancy, "Come, you shall start the dynamo yourself."

"Yes I will, and, I hope, kindle a flame that shall purge the earth
of tyranny and oppression for ever. Richard, what must my father be
thinking of just now down yonder in the cabin?"

"I dare not even guess. To-morrow or the next day will be the day of
reckoning, and then God help those of whom he demands payment, for
they will need it. The vials of wrath are full, and before long the
oppressors of the earth will have drained them to the dregs. Come, it
is time we went down."

They descended together to the engine-room, and meanwhile the
air-ship sank through the clouds until the lights of Aberdeen lay
about a thousand feet below. A lens of red glass had been fitted to
the searchlight of the _Ithuriel_, and all that was necessary was to
connect the forward engine with the dynamo.

Arnold put Natasha's hand on a little lever. As she took hold of it
she thought with a shudder of the mighty forces of destruction which
her next movement would let loose. Then she thought of all that those
nearest and dearest to her had suffered at the hands of Russian
despotism, and of all the nameless horrors of the rule whose
death-signal she was about to give.

As she did so her grip tightened on the lever, and when Arnold,
having given his orders to the head engineer as to speed and course,
put his hand on her shoulder and said, "Now!" she pulled it back with
a sharp, determined motion, and the next instant a broad fan of
blood-red light shot over the _Ithuriel's_ bows.

At the same moment the air-ship's propellers began to spin round, and
then with the flood of red light streaming in front of her, she
headed southward at full speed towards Edinburgh. The signal flashed
over the Scottish capital, and then the _Ithuriel_ swerved round to
the westward.

Half an hour later Glasgow saw it, and then away she sped southward
across the Border to Carlisle; and so through the long December night
she flew hither and thither, eastward and westward, flashing the red
battle-signal over field and village and town; and wherever it shone
armed men sprang up like the fruit of the fabled dragon's teeth,
companies were mustered in streets and squares and fields and