a long look all round the interior, and then leaped down,
followed by his attendant. Eveena drew back, but was at last persuaded
to mount the ladder with my assistance, and rest on the sill till I
followed her and lifted her down inside. The Regent had by this time
reached the machinery, and was examining it very curiously, with
greater apparent appreciation of its purpose than I should have
expected. When we joined them, I found little difficulty in explaining
the purpose and working of most parts of the apparatus. The nature and
generation of the apergic power I took care not to explain. The
existence of such a repulsive force was the point on which the Regent
professed incredulity; as it was, of course, the critical fact on
which my whole narrative turned--on which its truth or falsehood
depended. I resolved ere the close of the inspection to give him clear
practical evidence on this score. In the meantime, listening without
answer to his expressions of doubt, I followed him round the interior,
explaining to him and to Eveena the use and structure of the
thermometer, barycrite, and other instruments. My fair companion
seemed to follow my explanation almost as easily as the officials. Our
followers, who had now entered the vessel, kept within hearing of my
remarks; but, evidently aware that they were there on sufferance,
asked no questions, and made their comments in a tone too low to allow
me to understand their purport. The impression made on the Regent by
the instruments, so far as I could gather from his brief remarks and
the expression of his face, was one of contemptuous surprise rather
than the interest excited by the motive machinery. Most of them were
evidently, in his opinion, clumsy contrivances for obtaining results
which the scientific knowledge and inventive genius of his countrymen
had long ago secured more completely and more easily. But he was
puzzled by the combination of such imperfect knowledge or
semi-barbaric ignorance with the possession of a secret of such
immense importance as the repulsive current, not yet known nor, as I
gathered, even conceived by the inhabitants of this planet. When he
had completed his inspection, he requested permission to remove some
of the objects I had left there; notably many of the dead plants, and
several books of drawings, mathematical, mechanical, and ornamental,
which I had left, and which had not been brought away by my host's son
when he visited the vessel. Th