f replenishing our food supply," and quite seriously both
he and the Big Business Man laid aside some of their food.

"Thank me for that brilliant idea," said the Very Young Man. Then, as
another thought occurred to him, he scratched his head lugubriously.
"Wouldn't work very well if we were getting bigger, would it? Don't
let's ever get separated from any food coming out."

The Doctor was gigantic now in proportion to the other two, and both he
and the Big Business Man took a very small quantity more of the drug in
an effort to equalize their rate of bodily reduction. They evidently hit
it about right, for no further change in their relative size occurred.

All this time the vegetation underneath them had been growing steadily
larger. From tiny broken twigs it grew to sticks bigger than their
fingers, then to the thickness of their arms. They moved slightly from
time to time, letting it spread out from under them, or brushing it
aside and clearing a space in which they could sit more comfortably.
Still larger it grew until the tree-trunks, thick now almost as their
bodies, were lying broken and twisted, all about them. Over to one side
they could see, half a mile away, a place where the trees were still
standing--slender saplings, they seemed, growing densely together.

In half an hour more the Very Young Man announced he had stopped getting
smaller. The action of the drug ceased in the others a few minutes
later. They were still not quite in their relative sizes, but a few
grains of the powder quickly adjusted that.

They now found themselves near the edge of what once was a great forest.
Huge trees, whose trunks measured six feet or more in diameter, lay
scattered about upon the ground; not a single one was left standing. In
the distance they could see, some miles away, where the untrodden forest
began.

They had replaced the food in their belts some time before, and now
again they were ready to start. Suddenly the Very Young Man spied a
huge, round, whitish-brown object lying beside a tree-trunk near by. He
went over and stood beside it. Then he called his friends excitedly. It
was irregularly spherical in shape and stood higher than his knees--a
great jagged ball. The Very Young Man bent down, broke off a piece of
the ball, and, stuffing it into his mouth, began chewing with
enthusiasm.

"Now, what do you think of that?" he remarked with a grin. "A cracker
crumb I must have dropped when we first began lunch!