In the darkness and the mist we could see nothing of the ground below. The only visible things were a few mist-veiled stars above, and the bright scarlet torpedoes that shot after us. Quickly I circled and raised the helm. I was almost intoxicated with excitement, and the indescribable sensations of our swift and lofty flight. I felt released from all the weaknesses of the body; I felt as if I had conquered the force that holds all men to earth. I felt a new and wonderful sensation of freedom and power. I had but to move the little piece of metal in my hand to go where I pleased with the speed, almost, of light. But still came the line of ships behind us, at an incredible pace, stabbing at us with the green and orange rays. Then, high above the others, I brought the ship around in a hair-pin turn, and plunged directly at them. They tried to turn aside, while their rays shot thickly toward us, but our speed was too great. The foremost suddenly turned broadside toward us, attempting to get out of our path. I held our bow directly at it; raised it a trifle at the last instant. The keel of our vessel struck the other amidships. The terrific crash of the collision hurled us to the floor. When I regained my feet we were falling in a crazy twisting path, our ship altogether out of control. No sooner was I on my feet than the floor tilted up again and I fell back to my hands and knees. I saw that the one we had struck was broken in two and plunging toward the earth far behind us, while the other two were circling about, far overhead. The mist about us grew thicker until the other ships, and the fragments of the wrecked one, were strangely colored purple; thicker still, until they vanished. We floated in a world of purple fog. I seized the control lever as soon as our wild gyrations enabled me to reach it, but my unskilled efforts only resulted in making us roll and twist more wildly. So long as we had been on an even keel the piloting had been easy enough, although I imagine my success in ramming the other ship had been largely due to luck; but the blow against us had been sidewise, setting the ship to spinning like a top. It seemed that we fell an interminable time. Whenever the stern pointed downward for a moment, I pushed the lever forward, to check our fall as much as possible. Through the mist I suddenly caught a glimpse of the dark ground below. In another instant the vessel had struck heavily, throwing us against the floor again. Day was beginning to break at last, and we could see that we had fallen on a bare, gravelly hilltop. The clear space was only an acre or so in extent. We were shut in on all sides by a dense, dark forest of gigantic trees, that rose threateningly, seeming to grasp us, to close in on us. The purple mist hung in a sombre curtain overhead, only faintly lighted by the coming day. * * * * * The Silver Falls