Ig2 FOR THE FLAG

the machinery of the tug. . . . My charge’s mental state is
visibly better since he left Newburn. tess

The inventor occupies a separate room in Ker Karraje’s
residence. I do not doubt he is constantly talked ‘to,
especially by Serko. When they offer to pay him the ex-

~ orbitant price he demands for his machine—will he. have
the strength to resist? These wretches can dazzle him
with the sight of heaps of money amassed during all these
years of rapine! . . . In his present state of mind may he
not communicate the composition of his Fulgurator? It
would then be necessary only to bring the required
ingredients to. Backcup, and Thomas Roch will have
plenty of leisure to devote himself to his chemicals. As
for the shells, what is easier than to have a. certain
number made in some American works, or to order each
piece separately so as not to awaken suspicion? And it
is frightful to think of what such a destructive agent may
become in the hands of these pirates.

My intolerable apprehensions do not leave me an
hour’s peace. They are wearing me out and my health is
failing. Although there is fine fresh air in the interior of
Backcup, I sometimes feel Iam suffocating. It seems to
me these thick wal!s are crushing me with their weight.
Then I am separated from the rest of the world—as if in
another sphere—knowing nothing of what is passing’!
Ah! if it were possible to get out by that opening in the
roof which yawns above the lagoon, to escape by the top
of the island, and climb down to its base!

+ On the morning of the 25th July I at last encountered