On this point, judging from the severe tests which their protecting currents had withstood already, they were reassured, and then the whole company went nearly wild with enthusiasm. They were so delighted as almost to bewilder the three owners with thanks and congratulations for bringing them there, and to Godfrey also for his share in it, which made the four of them so shy and embarrassed that, in comic despair, they took Rollsborough by the collar and pushed him to the fore, as the one who had first suggested they should go _through_ the sun, and then _he_ became the centre of a fresh avalanche of applause; they chaired him, like a set of wild schoolboys, and kept it up till the simple, good-hearted little man nearly cried with pleasure and excitement, and could only say, hysterically, “No, no, gentlemen! not I, not I! I had no idea of this happening; I had not, really! Thank Oakland and his friends, and our good friend Spenser. Oh dear! gentlemen, don’t, I beg of you! It is very kind of you, very, but—no, no! I thank you sincerely, but—Oakland, and——” And, overwhelmed, he struggled and fought his way amongst his clamouring colleagues till he got to Dennis, under whose wing he took shelter, exclaiming, “Really, Oakland, all the thanks are due to you and to Eastern, and Ainley, and to Spenser, here, and how _can_ we thank you enough! What will the world say?” And the poor man mopped his forehead, agitated and perspiring. “The world!” interjected Godfrey, laughing. “What will the world say? It will say that we are one and all supreme liars, at the very least, possibly something stronger!—for to begin with, no one on Earth will believe for a moment that we have been under the sun’s enormous crust, or even _in_ the fiery sea at all.” No one seemed to have thought of that, and somebody suggested they should at once ‘wave’ the news to Earth and see how they took it, so Ross despatched the message, and after a while the instrument started and the reply came: “The _Regina_ is too small for us to pick her out on the sun’s disc. We note you say that you are inside the sun and appreciate your joke.” This was pinned up, and caused no little amusement, which soon turned to mortification when there dawned on them the utter impossibility of being able to prove their statements. The dust seemed exactly like that obtained up above, and therefore to say a portion of it had been obtained below the photosphere, and another portion high above, would be no proof that they had not divided it; and to bring back cylinders of pure nitrogen with a statement that it came from inside the crust would not prove that it had not been made on board. Neither would the miles of continuous photographs and spectrum films prove the positions from which they had been taken.