"So they can rule?"
"Yes; but what gives them the power to rule?"
"Oh, I see now! They get paid for it! And that is why the Krishnos have all the best things, and are better cared for than even the chiefs are?"
"You have given the right answer. The Krishnos don't want to sacrifice human life because they love to do it, but because in the doing of it they inspire fear, and through fear they can get what they want."
"But, Professor, you haven't yet told us how that is like the white people do it."
"In exactly the same way. The Krishnos own the big gun factories, and they tell the chiefs that the people across the river, or on the other side of the mountain are going to rise up against them, and they must arm the people and attack them. You see the white man's Krishnos have a great cave, called a gun factory, and while he does not want to offer up any sacrifices for the love of it, he does so because it is his business to make guns, and ammunition, and shells which explode with terrific force, and destroy hundreds at every shot."
"Well, after all, we are not much better than the[p. 32] savages here, are we?" said Harry, as he looked around, with a sad expression.
"We have advanced a little beyond them," interpolated John. "We have tried to systematize the killing. The savage goes at it without regard. But the white man has set rules to conduct the slaughter. Of course, the rules do not say that they shall not kill but it does point out the impolite ways of killing."
The Professor smiled at this homely way of putting it, but the boys looked doubtfully at John's exposition, and then George ventured to remark: "I can see the force of it, and it is my opinion that the savage way is, after all, the most reasonable."
"If it is not the most reasonable," answered the Professor, "it is certainly the most logical. But we are getting away from our subject. I understand from what John says that within the next week we shall be able to launch the vessel!"