"We have already lighted our fires, and our sailors are weighing the anchors. Will twelve o'clock suit you?" "To-day!" I shouted. "I rather think we must move to-day," said the captain. "If so, you must be content to take my dead body. It is now nearly eleven." "Half-past ten," said the captain, looking at his watch. "And I have no one ready to whom I can give up the archives of the Government." "I shall be happy to take charge of them," said Sir Ferdinando. "No doubt,--knowing nothing of the forms of our government, or--" "They, of course, must all be altered." "Or of the habits of our people. It is quite impossible. I, too, have the complicated affairs of my entire life to arrange, and my wife and son to leave though I would not for a moment be supposed to put these private matters forward when the public service is concerned. But the time you name is so unreasonable as to create a feeling of horror at your tyranny." "A feeling of horror would be created on the other side of the water," said Sir Ferdinando, "at the idea of what you may do if you escape us. I should not consider my head to be safe on my own shoulders were it to come to pass that while I am on the island an old man were executed in compliance with your system." Alas! I could not but feel how little he knew of the sentiment which prevailed in Britannula; how false was his idea of my power; and how potent was that love of life which had been evinced in the city when the hour for deposition had become nigh. All this I could hardly explain to him, as I should thus be giving to him the strongest evidence against my own philosophy. And yet it was necessary that I should say something to make him understand that this sudden deportation was not necessary. And then during that moment there came to me suddenly an idea that it might be well that I should take this journey to England, and there begin again my career,--as Columbus, after various obstructions, had recommenced his,--and that I should endeavour to carry with me the people of Great Britain, as I had already carried the more quickly intelligent inhabitants of Britannula. And in order that I may do so, I have now prepared these pages, writing them on board H.M. gunboat, the John Bright. "Your power is sufficient," I said. "We are not sure of that," said Sir Ferdinando. "It is always well to be on the safe side." "Are you so afraid of what a single old man can do,--you with your 250-ton swivellers, and your guard of marines, and your North-north-west Birmingham soldiery?"