Page:Hugh Pendexter--Tiberius Smith.djvu/255

 "In spots the trail was good, but generally we were kept busy dodging five-ton blocks of lava that were scattered munificently over the landscape. For you can't throw your hat anywhere in that region without tagging a volcano.

"‘Simply great!' cried Tib, as he reversed a lever and stopped so quickly that our machine boldly kissed the brow of a gigantic pill we unexpectedly met in gracefully slinking around a curve.

"‘Sure we're going right?' I queried, as my eye caught what seemed to be a forking of the highways.

"He asked me if I trusted him, or not, and I said I did at times; and to show his disdain for my personal opinion he chucked us into the third speed and took advantage of a long, narrow ribbon of turnpike to the right to test the Englishman's eulogiums on the car. I began to wish we'd taken the other branch, but his round face and bright brown eyes looked so merry as we scampered along I forgot it all.

"Then the grandeur of the thing stole into my veins as I gazed at the papa and baby mountains on all sides and realized it was given to us to be the original motor-car Columbuses to travel a path that had required several generations of aborigines to construct.

"Just think of them working for us! Actually