“I didn’t say that,” corrected Xirdal. “The thing is not easy. But we can try.”
He did try; and with such good effect that, on the 17th of August, he considered the success of his experiment as certain. The bolide had been deviated and would fall on terra firma, about fifty yards from the shore, a distance sufficient to maintain it from escaping.
Unluckily the tempest that raged during the couple of days following swept all the surface of the ground, and Xirdal had good reason to fear that the bolide’s trajectory might be affected by such a displacement of air. As we have already said, the storm dropped during the night between the 18th and 19th; but the two inhabitants of the hut did not avail themselves of the lull to take any rest. After watching the sun set, at rather more than half-
