evotion to the proprieties she would have obeyed her first
impulse and asked Lord Redgrave to put her on board the steamer.

While the officers and crew and passengers of the _Deutschland_ were
staring wide-eyed and open-mouthed at the graceful glittering shape of
the _Astronef_, Redgrave touched the first button in the second row
once, moved the 100-degree wheel on a few degrees, and then gave the
other a quarter turn. Then he closed the window slide, and the next
moment Zaidie saw the great liner sink down beneath them in a curious
twisting sort of way. She seemed to stop still and then spin round on
her centre, getting smaller and smaller every moment.

"What's the matter, Lenox?" she said, with a little gasp. "What's the
_Deutschland_ doing? She seems to be spinning round on her own axis like
a top."

"That's only the point of view, dear. She's just plugging along straight
on her way to New York, and we've been making rings round her and going
up all the time. But of course you don't notice the motion here any more
than you would if you were in a balloon."

"But I thought you were going to speak them. Surely you don't mean to
say that you intended that just as a little bit of showing off?"

"That's about what it comes to, I suppose, but you must not think it was
altogether vanity. You see the German Government has bought Count
Zeppelin's air-ship or steerable balloon, as it ought to be called,
always supposing that they can steer it in a wind, and of course their
idea is to make a fighting machine of it. Now Germany is engaged to
stand by us in this trouble that's coming, and by way of cementing the
alliance I thought it was just as well to let the wily Teuton know that
there's something flying the British flag which could make very small
mincemeat of their gas-bags."

"And what about Old Glory?" said Miss Zaidie. "The _Astronef_ was built
with English money and English skill, but----"

"She is the creature of American genius. Of course she is. In fact she
is the first concrete symbol of the Anglo-American Alliance, and when
the daughter of her creator has gone into partnership with the man who
made her we'll have two flagstaff's, and the Jack and Old Glory will
float side by side."

"And meanwhile where are we going?" asked Zaidie, after a moment's
interval. "Ah, there we are through the clouds again. What makes us
rise? Is that the force that Pop told me he discovered?"

"I'll answer the last question fi