her stricken people.

"My exit from the castle was made quite a ceremony. A band of music and
a guard of several hundred soldiers ushered me forth, walking beside the
king, with Lylda a few paces behind. As we passed through the streets of
the city, heading for the open country beyond, we were cheered
continually by the people who thronged the streets and crowded upon the
housetops to watch us pass.

"Outside Arite I was taken perhaps a mile, where a wide stretch of
country gave me the necessary space for my growth. We were standing upon
a slight hill, below which, in a vast semicircle, fully a hundred
thousand people were watching.

"And now, for the first time, fear overcame me. I realized my
situation--saw myself in a detached sort of way--a stranger in this
extraordinary world, and only the power of my drug to raise me out of
it. This drug you must remember, I had not as yet taken. Suppose it were
not to act? Or were to act wrongly?

"I glanced around. The king stood before me, quietly waiting my
pleasure. Then I turned to Lylda. One glance at her proud, happy little
face, and my fear left me as suddenly as it had come. I took her in my
arms and kissed her, there before that multitude. Then I set her down,
and signified to the king I was ready.

"I took a minute quantity of one of the drugs, and as I had done before,
sat down with my eyes covered. My sensations were fairly similar to
those I have already described. When I looked up after a moment, I found
the landscape dwindling to tiny proportions in quite as astonishing a
way as it had grown before. The king and Lylda stood now hardly above my
ankle.

"A great cry arose from the people--a cry wherein horror, fear, and
applause seemed equally mixed. I looked down and saw thousands of them
running away in terror.

"Still smaller grew everything within my vision, and then, after a
moment, the landscape seemed at rest. I kneeled now upon the ground,
carefully, to avoid treading on any of the people around me. I located
Lylda and the king after a moment; tiny little creatures less than an
inch in height. I was then, I estimated, from their viewpoint, about
four hundred feet tall.

"I put my hand flat upon the ground near Lylda, and after a moment she
climbed into it, two soldiers lifting her up the side of my thumb as it
lay upon the ground. In the hollow of my palm, she lay quite securely,
and very carefully I raised her up towards my face. Then, seeing tha