n, literally
exhausting it from surrounding space. The "_pullee_" came in at about a
half-billion volts, but in very heavy amperage, proportional to the
capacity of the receiver, and on a long wave--at audio frequency in
fact. About half of this power reception ultimately actuated the
_repeller ray_ generators. The other half was used to energize the _"B"
ionomagnetic_ coils, peculiarly wound affairs, whose magnetic fields
constituted the only means of insulating and controlling the circuits of
the three "powers."

The repeller ray generators, operating on this current, and in
conjunction with "twin synchronizers" in the power broadcast plant,
developed two rhythmically variable ether-ground circuits of opposite
polarity. In the "X" circuit, the negative was grounded along an
ultraviolet beam from the ship's repeller-ray generator. The positive
connection was through the ether to the "X synchronizer" in the power
plant, whose opposite pole was grounded. The "Y" circuit travelled the
same course, but in the opposite direction.

The rhythmic variables of these two opposing circuits, as nearly as I
can understand it, in heterodyning, created a powerful material "push"
from the earth, up along the violet ray beam against the _rep_ ray
generator and against the two synchronizers at the power plant.

This push developed molecularly from the earth-mass-resultant to the
generator; and at the same fractional distance from the _rep_ ray
generator to the power plant.

* * * * *

The force exerted upward against the ship was, of course, highly
concentrated, being confined to the path of the ultraviolet beam. Air or
any material substance, coming within the indicated section of the beam,
was thrown violently upward. The ships actually rode on columns of air
thus forcefully up-thrown. Their "home berths" and "stations" were
constructed with air pits beneath. When they rose from ordinary ground
in open country, there was a vast upheaval of earth beneath their
generators at the instant of take-off; this ceased as they got well
above ground level.

Equal pressure to the lifting power of the generator was exerted against
the synchronizers at the power plant, but this force, not being
concentrated directionally along an ultraviolet beam, involved a
practical problem only at points relatively close to the synchronizers.

Of course the synchronizers were automatically controlled by the
operation of th