“I have a toast to propose,” he continued, after a few moments’ silence, filling his glass as he spoke, “To our American friend: may he speedily be restored to his usual health!” While they drank to this, there came a scampering of feet upon the deck overhead, succeeded by a chorus of barks. The hounds, returned from the chase of the savages, had swum out to the vessel, and were clamouring for admittance at the turret door. CHAPTER XXXIII. THE INVENTOR’S STORY. “I RECKON it ’ud be powerful interesting to hear how you’ve been pegging along since Wilson left you.” Haverly’s voice was little more than a whisper as he spoke these words. He was mending rapidly, but he had not yet got about again, and the inventor, who had long since recovered from his injuries, was taking a spell below to bear him company. “Would you care to hear the yarn?” the inventor asked. “I guess I would,” was the reply. “Well, you see,” Garth began, “I was below when Wilson was attacked, attending to the damages we had sustained in our fight with the icthyosaurus. He will have told you of that?” Silas nodded. “Suddenly I heard the report of a revolver, and judging that something was wrong, I raced upstairs. You can guess my feelings when I saw Tom being carted away by some great flying creature. For a time I think I almost went mad. I raved up and down the deck like a maniac, cursing everything and everybody in this confounded underworld. “As my frenzy lessened, I realised the futility of my blind rage, and returned to my task, with a heart heavy for the loss of my chum. For, you know, I did not doubt that Tom was as good as dead; I never dreamed that he would be able to escape from the clutches of the brute--whatever it was--which had carried him off. How I finished those repairs I don’t know, but finish them I did at last, and backing the old _Seal_ off the beach, pushed her along up the coast. My movements were entirely aimless. I imagined that all of you were lost; that I alone was left of our party in this ghostly hole of a place, so I took little heed to my course, or perhaps I may have been spared one of the most fearful experiences that’s ever tumbled my way.