When he had completed his inspection, he requested permission to remove some of the objects I had left there; notably many of the dead plants, and several books of drawings, mathematical, mechanical, and ornamental, which I had left, and which had not been brought away by my host's son when he visited the vessel.

These I begged him to present to the Campta, adding to them a few smaller curiosities, after which I drew him back towards the machinery.

He summoned his attendant, and bade him take away to the carriages the articles I had given him, calling upon the intruders to assist.
I was thus left with him and with Eveena alone in the building; and with a partly serious, partly mischievous desire to prove to him the substantial reality of objects so closely related to my own disputed existence, and to demonstrate the truth of my story, I loosened one of the conductors, connected it with the machinery, and, directing it against him, sent through it a very slight apergic current.

I was not quite prepared for the result.

His Highness was instantly knocked head over heels to a considerable distance.