Now, when near the close, I can hold more closely to my text and deal only generally with our return trip to Terra. It is needless to dwell upon the way we missed and mourned the professor. At every turn some want developed which he could easily have satisfied had he been with us. However, his wisdom had started us correctly, and we had perforce to make shift and get along without him as best we could. As captain of the car, the weight of a great responsibility rested on me. I was almost constantly at the telescope, and I kept Gilhooly—in whom I had the most confidence—about as constantly at the switch board. We were menaced by frequent dangers during the trip, our course being literally strewn with meteoroids which it required much deft maneuvring to evade; but we came safely out of these perils, and, as if to compensate us for them, we formed a most happy juncture with the Earth’s orbit at a time when that planet was approaching and nearly upon us. With Gilhooly at the lever, and myself at the telescope, we accomplished a very successful landing. So evenly balanced did the car hang between the cubes and the drawing power of gravity that the last thousand feet of our descent was merely a floating earthward, and we alighted with so slight a shock that none of us experienced a particle of inconvenience. The land that claimed us was a deserted island in mid-Pacific, where we remained for two weeks, living off our food supply and keeping a sharp lookout for a sail. We had not been more than a day on the island before I remembered the document Professor Quinn had given me. I had been directed to open it while on our way through the great void, but I had been so burdened with responsibilities during that time that I had not once thought of the packet. With my four companions as auditors, I read aloud one of the papers inclosed in the packet, which was addressed to all of us jointly. "MY DEAR FRIENDS: When you read this, I trust that the plans of myself and Mr. Munn will have proved so far successful that an impassable gulf will stretch between you and the undersigned—and I write this out of a desire to have you speeding on your return to our native planet, not because I would willingly separate myself from you were circumstances here different from what we have found them. "As long as I live, I shall stand between King Gaddbai and any monstrous plan he may form, and attempt to carry out, looking to the subjugating of the world we know and love so well. I am convinced that the king has resources of which we know nothing, and it shall be my aim to fathom the resources of Njambai and assist in their development along other and more peaceable lines. This is to be my work, and I enter upon it with a tranquil soul.