The only communication that was now possible with Canada, and therefore with Boothia Land, was by means of aërographic messages transmitted from one station to another _via_ the north of Scotland, The Faroes, Iceland, Greenland, and Newfoundland, where the cable was working as usual. It took nearly twelve hours for the messages to reach the works, and the president had scarcely communicated its contents to his colleagues when the _Nadine_ came rushing full speed into Adelaide Bay with the news that the great Russian ice-breaker, with three other vessels in her wake, was steaming down from the northward about twenty miles away. CHAPTER XXVII The news of the coming of the expeditions was allowed to spread without comment through the works, and, to the intense surprise of the three involuntary guests of the Trust, no apparent precautions were taken to protect the works or the harbour in which the _Nadine_ and the _Washington_ were now lying against the coming of what everyone knew could be nothing but a hostile force. The two vessels having made their report, filled their bunkers and steamed out of the harbour again to the southward and westward. The great engines purred on, still draining Europe and Asia of their vital essence. An aërograph message was sent to King Edward and the President of the United States. The one to King Edward informed his Majesty that the president and board of trust, while insisting upon the terms of the circular they had addressed to the Powers of Europe, and giving fair warning of what would happen if those terms were ignored, were perfectly content to leave everything else in His Majesty's hands. The message to the President gave him all the news that there was to give, and informed him that as soon as the King's decision was announced the engines would be stopped, the insulators removed, and the electrical and magnetic currents allowed to flow back over their natural courses, the result of which would be that, in from twenty-four to thirty-six hours, normal conditions would be re-established, and the business of the world could go on as usual. All fighting, however, save under a war-tax of a dollar per head per week of men engaged in armies and fleets would be prohibited. If this condition, which the London manager of the Trust had been instructed to lay before His Majesty and the foreign Ministers in London, were violated, the engines would be started again, with the same results as before.