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in fact, but a large quantity of oiled silk, a car, a few ropes,
&c., &c., and some light kind of gas, such as the antiquar-
ians who were acquainted with the means employed by the
ancients for the production of the lighter gases could easily
instruct her workmen how to provide. Her eagerness to see
so strange a sight as the ascent of a human being into the sky
overcame any scruples of conscience that she might have
otherwise felt, and she set the antiquarians about showing
her workmen how to make the gas, and sent her maids to
buy, and oil, a very large quantity of silk (for I was deter-
mined that the balloon should be a big one) even before she
began to try and gain the King’s permission; this, however,
she now set herself to do, for I had sent her word that my
prosecution was imminent.
As for myself, I need hardly say that I knew nothing about
balloons; nor did I see my way to smuggling Arowhena
into the car; nevertheless, knowing that we had no other
chance of getting away from Erewhon, I drew inspiration
from the extremity in which we were placed, and made a
pattern from which the Queen’s workmen were able to work
successfully. Meanwhile the Queen’s carriage-builders set
about making the car, and it was with the attachments of
this to the balloon that I had the greatest difficulty; I doubt,
indeed, whether I should have succeeded here, but for the
great intelligence of a foreman, who threw himself heart and
soul into the matter, and often both foresaw requirements,
the necessity for which had escaped me, and suggested the
means of providing for them.
It happened that there had been a long drought, during

Erewhon