to be submitted to investigation."

"By Jo!" exclaimed Jack, running his hands through his hair, and
smoothing his torn and rumpled garments, "then we must make ready for
inspection. But I'm afraid we won't do much honor to old New York. Can I
get a shave aboard your craft, Edmund?"

"Oh, yes," Edmund replied, laughing. "I didn't forget soap and razors."

But Jack would have had no time to make his toilet even if he had
seriously thought of it. The strange objects in the air approached with
great rapidity, and we soon saw that Edmund had correctly divined their
nature. They were certainly air ships, and I was greatly interested in
the observation that they seemed to be constructed somewhat upon the
principles upon which our inventors were then working on the earth. But
they were neither aeroplanes nor balloons. They bore a resemblance to
mechanical birds, and seemed to be sustained and forced ahead by a
wing-like action.

This, of course, did not escape Edmund's notice.

"Look," he said admiringly, "how easily and gracefully they fly. Perhaps
with our relatively light atmosphere we shall never be able to do that
on the earth; but no matter," he added, with a flush, "for with the
inter-atomic energy at our command, we shall have no need to imitate the
birds."

"Perhaps they have made that discovery here, too," I suggested.

"No, it is evident that they have not, else they would not be employing