I expected to see them leap off
and run, which no doubt they would have done if Edmund had not taken, for
other reasons, the precaution to tie them fast. But they strained at
their bonds, and squealed in terror.
"Give me your pistol!" commanded Edmund, in a voice of thunder, and with
blazing eyes.
Jack was almost twice his size, but he handed over the pistol with the
air of a rebuked schoolboy.
"When you learn how to use it, I'll give it back to you," said Edmund
sternly, and that closed the incident.
Then we began gradually to put on speed, and as the ground was icy smooth
and entirely unobstructed, we were soon traveling at the rate of sixty
miles an hour. The plan of the sleds worked like magic, and after their
first terror had passed away it was plain to be seen that the natives
enjoyed the new sensation immensely. And, indeed, it was a glorious spin!
But in a little while a danger developed which we had not thought of. It
arose from the existence of other caverns whose mouths opened upon the
plain. To have precipitated the sleds into these would have been fatal.
Luckily, shafts of light issued from all of them, and warned by these, we
managed to avoid the danger.
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