It was plain the Bonians were not of the same substance as Earthy folk, and therefore only the laboratory could restore the Terrestrians to their personal comfort and, in Ross’s case, good looks, for the other two didn’t mind much, not having so much to lose. So off they started straight for the ship, like three enormous blue-bottle flies walking upright, sans wings, with a crowd of fair, English-flesh-coloured people in their wake. Telling them by signs that they would soon come out again the same colour as the natives, they rushed to the laboratory and bathed themselves first in one thing and then another, but nothing would make the slightest impression on their blueness. They were well and truly dyed and polished with a very fast colour, and at the end of their exertions, with blistered, sore and cracking skin, they had to face the fact as it stood, and trust to time to bring them to their normal condition. Meanwhile the Bonians were free to consider all people on Earth like the sample submitted, which was felt to be a severe blow to England’s pride and glory as represented by the three explorers, and to Ross in particular, for apparently never more would his clear skin and chestnut hair be admired by any one unless they were predisposed to take the blues. “We’ve got to stay here till we pale again, that’s clear!” declared he, emphatically. “I shall never go back to England this colour, if I never go at all!” “And I have no ambition to be one of the first blue men on the face of the Earth!” agreed Gilbert, ruefully. “We’ll see!” said Dennis, cheerily. “It may wear off in a day or two.” “That’s all right; the people here think we are naturally blue, and we cannot undeceive them, worse luck! But I am certainly not going to give any others a sight of myself just yet!” retorted Ross, saying which he set about preparing their simple meal, it being his turn. “We have not attempted to telepath with these people,” remarked Dennis, after their meal. “Thought is universal and knows no language, and we might be able to exchange ideas that way as conversation is not possible.” “Certainly!” replied Gilbert. “We can try it anyway, and if successful they may perhaps tell us how we can get rid of this dreadful metallic blueness, and ease Ross’s mind. I see they are waiting for us.”