"By Jo, Edmund, you're a trump! I'd like to get a gaff into the gills of that catfish, Ingra, when he begins to blow. By Jo, I'd pickle him and make a present of him to the Museum of Natural History. '_Catfishia Venusensis_, presented by Jack Ashton, Esq.'--how'd that look on a label, hey?" And Jack hugged himself with delight over his conceit. In a short time the accuracy of Edmund's conjecture became apparent. Our pursuers, one by one, dropped off. Their own strategy, to which Jack had called attention, was simply a playing into our hands. They had really thought to catch us in the center of a contracting circle, when, to their amazement, we rose straight up into air so rare that they could not live in it. Edmund roared with laughter when he saw the assured success of his maneuver. But there was one thing which even he had overlooked, and it struck to our hearts when we became aware of it. Poor, faithful Juba, who had so recently proved his devotion to us, could endure this rare air no better than our pursuers. Already, unnoticed in the excitement, he had fallen upon the deck, where he lay gasping. "Good God, he's dying!" exclaimed Jack. "He shall not die!" responded Edmund, setting his lips, and turning to his machinery. "But, you're not going back down there!" "I'll run beyond the edge of the circle, and drop down far enough to revive him. Then we can keep dodging up and down just out of their reach, and so be out of danger both ways." No sooner said than done. We ran rapidly on a horizontal course until we had cleared the air ships below, and then dropped like a shot. Juba came to his senses in a few moments after we entered the denser air. But now our pursuers, thinking, no doubt, that we had found it impracticable to remain where they knew they could not go, began to close in upon us. I reflected that here was the only mistake that Edmund had made--I mean the bringing along with us of the natives of the dark hemisphere. It was only their presence that had prevented us from sailing triumphantly over the crystal mountains; it was because of them that we had wrecked the car; and now it was Juba who baffled our best chance of escape. And yet--and I am glad to be able to say it--I could not regret his presence, for had he not made himself one of us; had he not proved himself entitled to all the privileges of comradeship? But Henry (I am sorry to write it) did not share these feelings. "Edmund," he said, "why do you insist upon endangering our lives for the sake of this--this--animal here?" Never have I beheld such a blaze of anger as that which burst from Edmund's eyes as he turned upon Henry: "You cowardly brute!" he shouted. "I ought to throw you overboard!"