Page:Tarzan and the Ant Men.pdf/205

Rh The work had been progressing for perhaps two or three hours when two warriors descended the tunnel and halted beside Kalfastoban. They were escorting a green-tunicked slave, to whom Tarzan paid no more attention than he did to the warriors until a scrap of the conversation between the warriors and Kalfastoban reached his ears, then he shot a quick glance in the direction of the four and saw that the slave was Komodoflorensal, Prince of Trohanadalmakus, known in the quar­ries of Veltopismakus as Slave Aoponato, or 8003+19 which is written in Minunian hiero­glyphics.

Tarzan’s number, Aopontando, 8003+21, ap­peared thus, upon the shoulder of his green tunic:.

Although the Minunian form occupies less space than would our English equivalent of Tarzan’s number, which is 512,000,021, it would be more difficult to read if expressed in English words, for it then would be, ten times ten times eight, cubed, plus seven times three; but the Mi­nunians translate it in no such way. To them it is a whole number, Aopontando, which represents at first glance a single quantity as surely as do the digits 37 represent to our minds an invariable amount, a certain, definite measure of quantity which we never think of as three times ten plus seven, which, in reality, it is. The Minunian ­