Astounding Science Fiction, British Edition — page 112: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

110 the original group of stakes, but Barlennan called to them to wait. “There aren’t so many blocking the canal we were digging. Don, did the Flyer say how long it would take to pull them out with that contrap- tion?” , *““He wasn’t sure, since he didn’t know how deeply they were buried or how fast we could operate it; but he guessed at a day or so each—faster than we could cut through them.” ‘But not so fast that we wouldn’t gain time by having some of us finish that canal while you take as many men as you need to pull the stakes in it. Incidentally, did he have any name for the thing?” “He called it a differential hoist. The second word is plain enough, but I don’t see how to translate the first— it’s just a noise to me.” *“Me, too. Differential it is. Let’s get to work; your watch to the hoist, and mine to the canal.” The crew buckled down with a will. The canal was finished first, since it quickly became evident that most of the crew would be free to dig; two sailors, taking turns on the hoist at intervals of a few minutes, proved enough to start the spear shafts sliding very slowly out of the hard ground. To Barlennan’s satisfaction the heads came with them, so that he had eight very effective looking spears when the operation was completed. His people did little work in stone, and the quartz heads were extremely valuable in his estimation. Once through the barrier, the dis- tance to the lake was relatively short; and there they stopped to reassemble the Bree in her natural form. This was quickly accomplished—indeed, the crew might now be considered expert at the task—and once more the ship floated in relatively deep water. The Earthmen above heaved ~ % r Act — . " ats rer oe eer ‘ae Eth ~ PR ee SAREE, SMERR TS Gia rs } © SOUS Oe Se ae , iy z ; ke >> 4 er : v T3\ . 5 ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION a collective sigh of relief. This proved to be premature. The gliders had been passing back and forth throughout the journey from the trading site. If their crews had been at all surprised at the method used to extract the spears, no evidence had appeared of the fact. Barlennan, of course, hoped they had seen and added the information to the list of his own people’s superior accomplish- ments. He was not too surprised to see a dozen gliders on the beach near the mouth of the fiord, and ordered the helmsman to turn the ship ashore at that point. Perhaps at least the islanders would notice that he had recovered the spears intact. Reejaaren was the first to greet them as the Bree anchored a few yards offshore. “So your ship is seaworthy again, eh? I’d try to meet any more storms a long way from land, if I were you.” “Right,” Barlennan agreed. “The difficulty in a sea you don’t know is being sure where you stand in that respect. Perhaps you would tell us the disposition of lands in this sea? Or would you, perhaps, have charts you could provide us with? I should have thought to ask before.” “Qur charts of these islands, of course, are secret,’’ the interpreter replied. ““You should be out of the group in forty or fifty days, however, and then there is no land for some thousands of days’ sail to the south. I do not know your ship’s speed, so I cannot guess just when you are likely to make it. Such lands as there are are mostly islands at first; then the coast of the land you crossed turns east, and if you keep straight south you will encounter it at about—”’ he gave an expression which referred to a spring balance reading, and cor- responded to about forty-five Earth gravities of latitude. “Il could tell you about many of the countries along Connicloooks COA