osed."

"I am hungry, and am going to eat," said the American, drawing a
cushioned stool up to the table. "Here goes for some of the wine;
remember, it is a sort of breath-restorer. I am curious enough not to
want to collapse till I have seen this thing through. He said something
about a palace and a king. Where can we be going?"

"Down into the centre of the earth, possibly," and the handsome
Englishman moved a stool to the table and took the glass of
green-colored wine that Johnston pushed toward him. "Some scientists
hold that the earth is filled with water instead of fire. Who knows
where this blamed thing may not take us? Here is to a safe return from
the amphibious land!"

Both drank their wine simultaneously, lowered their glasses at the same
instant, and gazed into each other's eyes.

"Did you ever taste such liquor?" asked Thorndyke, "it seems to run like
streams of fire through every vein I have."

Johnston shook his head mutely, and held the sparkling effervescing
fluid between him and the light.

"Ugh! take it down," cried the Englishman, "it throws a green color on
your face that makes you look like a corpse." Johnston clinked the glass
against that of his companion and they drained the glasses. "Hush, what
was that?" asked Thorndyke.

There was a sound like boiling water outside and as if air were being
pumped out of some receptacle, and the vessel began to move up and down
in a lithe sort of fashion and to bend tortuously from side to side like
a great sluggish fish. Through the partitions of glass they saw one of
the men closing the door, and in a moment the vessel glided away from
the shore. The men all sank into easy positions on the couches, and
delightful music as soft as an Aeolian lyre seemed to be breathed from
the walls and floor. Then the music seemed to die away and a bell down
in the vessel's hull rang.

"We are in the middle of the lake," said Thorndyke, looking through
the glass toward the black cliffy shore; "the next thing will be our
descent. I wonder----"

But he was unable to proceed, and Johnston noticed in alarm that
his eyes were slightly protruding from their sockets. The air seemed
suddenly to become more compact as if compressed, and the water was set
into such violent commotion that it was dashed against the glass sides
in billows as white as snow. Then Johnston found that he could not
breathe freely, and he understood the trouble of the Englishman.

Captain Tradmos