ts, and saw that they were inflamed with uproar
and tossing passions.

"We arrive at a happy moment," said the man steering the ship. "The
insurgents are bombarding the city, and a cannon-ball has just hit the
cross. Many of the insurgents are simple people, and they naturally
regard it as a happy omen."

"Quite so," said Turnbull, in a rather colourless voice.

"Yes," replied the other. "I thought you would be glad to see your
prayer answered. Of course I apologize for the word prayer."

"Don't mention it," said Turnbull.

The flying ship had come down upon a sort of curve, and was now rising
again. The higher and higher it rose the broader and broader became the
scenes of flame and desolation underneath.

Ludgate Hill indeed had been an uncaptured and comparatively quiet
height, altered only by the startling coincidence of the cross fallen
awry. All the other thoroughfares on all sides of that hill were full
of the pulsation and the pain of battle, full of shaking torches and
shouting faces. When at length they had risen high enough to have a
bird's-eye view of the whole campaign, Turnbull was already intoxicated.
He had smelt gunpowder, which was the incense of his own revolutionary
religion.

"Have the people really risen?" he asked, breathlessly. "What are they
fighting about?"

"The programme is rather elaborate," said his entertainer with some
indifference. "I think Dr. Hertz drew it up."

Turnbull wrinkled his forehead. "Are all the poor people with the
Revolution?" he asked.

The other shrugged his shoulders. "All the instructed and
class-conscious part of them without exception," he replied. "There
were certainly a few districts; in fact, we are passing over them just
now----"

Turnbull looked down and saw that the polished car was literally lit
up from underneath by the far-flung fires from below. Underneath whole
squares and solid districts were in flames, like prairies or forests on
fire.

"Dr. Hertz has convinced everybody," said Turnbull's cicerone in a
smooth voice, "that nothing can really be done with the real slums. His
celebrated maxim has been quite adopted. I mean the three celebrated
sentences: 'No man should be unemployed. Employ the employables. Destroy
the unemployables.'"

There was a silence, and then Turnbull said in a rather strained voice:
"And do I understand that this good work is going on under here?"

"Going on splendidly," replied his companion in the heartiest voic