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 "Of course we must make it again," he said, with a sort of glee I had not expected in him, "of course we must make it again. We have caught a tartar, perhaps, but we have left the theoretical behind us for good and all. If we can possibly avoid wrecking this little planet of ours we will. But—there must be risks! There must be. In experimental work there always are! And here, as a practical man, you must come in. For my own part, it seems to me we might make it edgewise, perhaps, and very thin. Yet I don't know—I have a certain dim perception of another method. I can hardly explain it yet. But curiously enough it came into my mind while I was rolling over and over in the mud before the wind and very doubtful how the whole adventure was to end, as being absolutely the thing I ought to have done."

Even with my aid we found some little difficulty and meanwhile we kept at work restoring the laboratory. There was plenty to do before it was absolutely necessary to decide upon the precise form and method of our second attempt. Our only hitch was the strike of the three labourers, who objected to my activity as a foreman. But that matter we compromised after two days' delay.