d the Great
Sloth climbed slowly back over it into its room to find out who had
dared to outrage its Slothful Majesty.

Lucy waited, breathless with hope and fear, as the Great Sloth blundered
back into the inner room of its temple. It did not come out again.
There was a silence, and then a creaking sound and the voice of the
Great Sloth saying:

'No, no, no, I won't. Let go, I tell you.' Then more sounds of creaking
and the sound of metal on metal.

She crept to the arch and peeped round it.

The room that had been full of feather-bed was now full of wheels and
cogs and bands and screws and bars. It was full, in fact, of a large and
complicated machine. And the handle of that machine was being turned by
the Great Sloth itself.

'Let me go,' said the Great Sloth, gnashing its great teeth. 'I won't
work!'

'You must,' said a purring voice from the heart of the machinery. 'You
wished for me, and now you have to work me eight hours a day. It is the
law'; it was the machine itself which spoke.

'I'll break you,' said the Sloth.

'I am unbreakable,' said the machine with gentle pride.

'This is your doing,' said the Sloth, turning its furious eyes on Lucy
in the doorway. 'You wait till I catch you!' And all the while it had to
go on turning that handle.

'Thank you,' said Lucy politely; 'I think I will not wait. And I shall
have eight hours' start,' she added.

Even as she spoke a stream of clear water began to run from the pumping
machine. It slid down the gold steps and across the golden court. Lucy
ran out into the ruined square of the city shouting:

'Halma! Halma! Halma! To me, Halma's men!'

And the men, already excited by Philip, who had gone about saying that
name of power without a moment's pause all the time Lucy had been in the
golden temple, gathered round her in a crowd.

'Quick!' she said; 'the Great Sloth is pumping water up for you. He will
pump for eight hours a day. Quick! dig a channel for the water to run
in. The Deliverer,' she pointed to Philip, 'has given you back your
river.'

Some ran to look out old rusty half-forgotten spades and picks. But
others hesitated and said:

'The Great Sloth will work for eight hours, and then it will be free to
work vengeance on us.'

'I will go back,' said Lucy, 'and explain to it that if it does not
behave nicely you will all wish for machine guns, and it knows now
that if people wish for machinery they have to use it. It will be
awake now for e