“You told me of mighty fortresses of stone which a thousand men armed with big and little engines such as these could hold forever against a million Sagoths.
“You told me of great canoes which moved across the water without paddles, and which spat death from holes in their sides.
“All these may now belong to the men of Pellucidar. Why should we fear the Mahars?
“Let them breed! Let their numbers increase by thousands. They will be helpless before the power of the Emperor of Pellucidar.
“But if you remain a prisoner in Phutra, what may we accomplish?
“What could the men of Pellucidar do without you to lead them?
“They would fight among themselves, and while they fought the Mahars would fall upon them, and even though the Mahar race should die out, of what value would the emancipation of the human race be to them without the knowledge, which you alone may wield, to guide them toward the wonderful civilization of which you have told me so much that I long for its comforts and luxuries as I never before longed for anything.
“No, David; the Mahars cannot harm us if you are at liberty. Let them have their secret that you and I may return to our people, and lead them to the conquest of all Pellucidar.”
It was plain that Dian was ambitious, and that her ambition had not dulled her reasoning faculties. She was right. Nothing could be gained by remaining bottled up in Phutra for the rest of our lives.
It was true that Perry might do much with the contents of the prospector, or iron mole, in which I had brought down the implements of outer-world civilization; but Perry was a man of peace. He could never weld the warring factions of the disrupted federation. He could never win new tribes to the empire. He would fiddle around manufacturing gun-powder and trying to improve upon it until some one blew him up with his own invention. He wasn’t practical. He never would get anywhere without a balance-wheel—without some one to direct his energies.