Among the nations of Anglo-Saxondom the change had manifested itself by a swift decadence into the worst forms of unbridled democracy. Men’s minds were unhinged, and the most extravagant opinions found acceptance. Parliaments had already been made annual and were fast sinking into machines for registering the ever-changing opinions of rival factions and their leaders. Sovereigns and presidents were little better than popular puppets existing on sufferance. In short, all that Paul Romanoff had prophesied was coming to pass more rapidly than even he had expected so far as the area of the Anglo-Saxon Federation was concerned. In the Moslem Empire affairs were different, but no less threatening. The Sultan Khalid the Magnificent, as he was justly styled by his admirers, saw clearly that the time must come when this mysterious enemy would emerge from the waters and attempt the conquest of the land, and for three years past he had been manufacturing weapons and forming armies against the day of battle which he considered inevitable, and which he longed for rather than dreaded. Thus, while Anglo-Saxondom was lapsing into the anarchy of unrestrained democracy, the Moslem monarch was preparing to take advantage of the issue of events which, skilfully turned to account, might one day make him master of the world. Such was the condition of affairs throughout the world on the 1st of May 2036, and then the long-expected came in strange and terrible shape. At midnight a blaze of light was seen far up in the sky over the city of Aeria. A moment later something that must have been a small block of metal fell from a tremendous height in the square in the centre of the city, and was shivered to fragments by the force of its fall. On the splintered pavement where it fell was found a little roll of parchment addressed to the President. It was taken to him, and he opened it and read these words:-- To Alan Arnold, President of Aeria. If you want your son Alan and his friend Alexis, go and look for them on an island which you will find near the intersection of the 40th parallel of south latitude and the 120th meridian of west longitude in the South Pacific. They have served my turn, and I have done with them. Perhaps they will be able to tell you how I have conquered the Empire of the Sea. Before long I shall have wrested the Empire of the Air from you as well. OLGA ROMANOFF. CHAPTER IX. THE FLIGHT OF THE “REVENGE.” ASTOUNDING, almost stupefying, as were the tidings conveyed by this letter, which had dropped like a veritable bolt from the blue, the challenge contained in the last sentence and the ominous name with which it was signed were matters of infinitely greater and more instant importance.