ight hours and if you all work for eight hours a day
you'll soon have your city as fine as ever. And there's one new law.
Every time the clock strikes you must all say "Halma!" aloud, every one
of you, to remind yourselves of your great destiny, and that you are no
longer slaves of the Great Sloth.'

[Illustration: And all the while it had to go on turning that handle.]

She went back and explained machine guns very carefully to the now
hard-working Sloth. When she came back all the men were at work digging
a channel for the new river.

The women and children crowded round Lucy and Philip.

'Ah!' said the oldest woman of all, 'now we shall be able to wash in
water. I've heard my grandmother say water was very pleasant to wash in.
I never thought I should live to wash in water myself.'

'Why?' Lucy asked. 'What do you wash in?'

'Pine-apple juice,' said a dozen voices, 'when we _do_ wash!'

'But that must be very sticky,' said Lucy.

'It is,' said the oldest woman of all; 'very!'

CHAPTER XI

THE NIGHT ATTACK

The Halma men were not naturally lazy. They were, in the days before the
coming of the Great Sloth, a most energetic and industrious people. Now
that the Sloth was obliged to work eight hours a day, the weight of its
constant and catching sleepiness was taken away, and the people set to
work in good earnest. (I did explain, didn't I, that the Great Sloth's
sleepiness really was catching, like measles?)

So now the Halma men were as busy as ants. Some dug the channel for the
new stream, some set to work to restore the buildings, while others
weeded the overgrown gardens and ploughed the deserted fields. The head
Halma man painted in large letters on a column in the market-place these
words:

'This city is now called by its ancient name of Briskford. Any citizen
found calling it Somnolentia will not be allowed to wash in water for a
week.'

The head-man was full of schemes, the least of which was the lighting of
the town by electricity, the power to be supplied by the Great Sloth.

'He can't go on pumping eight hours a day,' said the head-man; 'I can
easily adjust the machine to all sorts of other uses.'

In the evening a banquet was (of course) given to the Deliverers. The
banquet was all pine-apple and water, because there had been no time to
make or get anything else. But the speeches were very flattering; and
Philip and Lucy were very pleased, more so than Brenda, who did not like
pine