So far as my utmost efforts can ensure it you will be safe; an obligation higher, and enforced by sanctions graver, than even the Campta's command forbids me to lead a _brother_ into peril, and fail to bring him out of it." The significant word was spoken in so low a tone that it could not possibly reach the ears of our companions of the chase, who had mustered on shore within a few feet of the vessel.

But Eveena evidently caught both the sound and the meaning, and I was glad that they should convey to her a confidence which seemed to myself no better founded than her alarms.

To me its only value lay in the friendly relation it established with one I had begun greatly to like.
I relied on my own strength and nerve for all that human exertion could do in such peril as we might encounter; and, in a case in which these might fail me, I doubted whether even the one tie that has binding force on Mars would avail me much.
Immediately outside the town were waiting, saddled but not bridled, some score of the extraordinary riding-birds Eveena had described.

The seat of the rider is on the back, between the wings; but the saddle consists only of a sort of girth immediately in front, to which a pair of stirrups, resembling that of a lady's side-saddle, were attached.
The creature that was to carry my unusual weight was the most powerful of all, but I felt some doubt whether even his strength might not break down.

One of the hunters had charge of a carriage on which was fixed a cage containing two dozen birds of a dark greenish grey, about the size of a crow, and with the slender form, piercing eyes, and powerful beak of the falcon.