er
at the stem of the machine, where his personal luggage, his wraps and
restoratives were placed, and which also with the seats, served as a
makeweight to the parts of the central engine that projected to the
propeller at the stern.

The engine was very simple in appearance. Asano, pointing out the
parts of this apparatus to him, told him that, like the gas-engine of
Victorian days, it was of the explosive type, burning a small drop of
a substance called "fomile" at each stroke. It consisted simply of
reservoir and piston about the long fluted crank of the propeller shaft.
So much Graham saw of the machine.

The flying stage about him was empty save for Asano and their suite of
attendants. Directed by the aeronaut he placed himself in his seat. He
then drank a mixture containing ergot--a dose, he learnt, invariably
administered to those about to fly, and designed to counteract the
possible effect of diminished air pressure upon the system. Having done
so, he declared himself ready for the journey. Asano took the empty
glass from him, stepped through the bars of the hull, and stood below on
the stage waving his hand. Suddenly he seemed to slide along the stage
to the right and vanish.

The engine was beating, the propeller spinning, and for a second the
stage and the buildings beyond were gliding swiftly and horizontally
past Graham's eye; then these things seemed to tilt up abruptly. He
gripped the little rods on either side of him instinctively. He felt
himself moving upward, heard the air whistle over the top of the
wind screen. The propeller screw moved round with powerful rhythmic
impulses--one, two, three, pause; one, two, three--which the engineer
controlled very delicately. The machine began a quivering vibration that
continued throughout the flight, and the roof areas seemed running away
to starboard very quickly and growing rapidly smaller. He looked from
the face of the engineer through the ribs of the machine. Looking
sideways, there was nothing very startling in what he saw--a rapid
funicular railway might have given the same sensations. He recognised
the Council House and the Highgate Ridge. And then he looked straight
down between his feet.

For a moment physical terror possessed him, a passionate sense of
insecurity. He held tight. For a second or so he could not lift his
eyes. Some hundred feet or more sheer below him was one of the big
windvanes of south-west London, and beyond it the southernmost