"A place said to be named Hygeia."

"Oh, yes, I remember now that it was second on the list. I was supposed to read up what little is known about these dumps but never found the time. What information have you got in that little book of yours?"

"Not much. Hygeia is recorded as a warm, lush and fertile world that was confiscated by a crowd who called themselves the Sons of Freedom. They went away, shipload by shipload, until there were none left on Terra. Some time latter another and different lot, known as Naturists, also went to Hygeia, presumably with the consent of the first ones. The grand total of those who scooted is not known but is thought to be about two and a half millions."

"Sons of Freedom," cogitated the Ambassador. "Weren't they a religious sect better known as Quakers?"

"No, Your Excellency. You are thinking of the Society of Friends. They took over a planet which they named Amity. It isn't on our list for this trip. Maybe some other expedition is looking them up."

"In which case they'll be dead out of luck," put in Shelton. "I read about them once and have good reason to remember them. Stiff-necked pacifists, every one."

"What do we care?" asked the Ambassador. "Let them be somebody else's grief."

"This other mob may be just as bad," Shelton offered. "I've never heard of the Sons of Freedom but it sounds anarchistic to me."

"Know anything about them, Captain?" the Ambassador asked.

"No, Your Excellency. More than three hundred minorities took flight during the years of the Great Explosion. One cannot remember the full details of all of them."

"I suppose not. We could do with a professor of history on board." He contemplated the wall in meditative silence, then said, "One thing is sure-they'll be crackpots. But it can be said that crackpots are a few cuts above common criminals."

"Provided they keep their thieving ringers to themselves," topped Shelton. "I have an idea that the moment all these isolated groups set greedy eyes on a ship loaded with stuff they need they'll immediately believe in Santa Claus."

"Well, you've got one worry off your mind," the Ambassador told him. "They cannot steal a trumpet."

The next world bloomed out of space like a brilliant blue-green ball that circled a pale orange sun closely resembling Sol. Nine other planets and a dozen satellites completed this system but according to ancient reports Hygeia was the only one inhabited.

Cameras started snapping the day-side as soon as the planet had swelled sufficiently for its surface details to be revealed. Vast areas of forest stood untouched, many rivers flowed without a bridge across them. A considerable portion of the land area remained undeveloped and perhaps unexplored.

All the same, the occupied part of the territory showed that the settlers had done well for themselves. Highways and railroad tracks ran through many of the broadest, most fertile valleys which were intensively cultivated to the very edge of the forests. Through these valleys, villages and towns were strung like beads. Here and there small factories could be seen, also several quarries and opencast mining sites. There was a waterside city with a dockyard system in which white-sailed ships were lying at rest.

The general impression was of a population several times larger and considerably more energetic than that of the previous world. These visible results formed an object lesson for the lazy and proved yet again that by the sweat of thy brow shalt thou achieve something or other.

For his landing Grayder picked a long, low ridge with a granite outcrop. He was not interested in choosing the best position from the strategic viewpoint; the tonnage he was handling demanded a resting-place of solid bedrock and it was his responsibility to put the ship down someplace where it would not bury itself up to the airlock doors.

The vessel settled with the usual creaking and cracking sounds beneath the keel. Power cut off. Air-vents gaped and sucked in fresh atmosphere, warm and rich with oxygen. The fore, aft and midway airlocks were opened. This time the crew did not drop a ladder: they lowered the gangways. Emergence was in strict order of precedence. First the Ambassador who planted an august foot on the world with the air of saying, "I claim this planet in the name of Terra." Second came Captain Grayder, informal and impassive. Third, Colonel Shelton, frowning around as if hoping for the best but expecting the worst. Fourth, the senior civil servant, peering curiously through thick-lensed glasses.

Then, of course, the next grade lower and in the same order: His Excellency's private secretary, the ship's second officer, Major Hame, second in command of troops, the penultimate pen-pusher.

Down another grade and then another until there was left only His Excellency's barber, boot-wiper and valet, crew-members with the lowly status of O.S.Ordinary Spaceman-troopers with the lowlier status of plain, nondescript troopers, and a number of temporary ink-pots dreaming of the day when they would be made permanent and given desks of their own. This last collection of unfortunates remained aboard to clean ship and refrain from smoking, by command.

Had the world been alien, hostile and well-armed the order of exit would have been reversed, thus exemplifying the Biblical promise that the last shall be first and the first shall be last. But this planet, though officially new, unofficially was not new and certainly not alien. As for its total lack of hostility, that was taken for granted. The Hygeians were not criminals and therefore could be trusted to show proper respect for their betters.

From the foot of the ridge stretched fields bearing a heavy crop of what resembled barley. A gentle wind sent shadows racing through the grain like waves upon a sea. On one side the cultivation ended where the forest began at the rim of the horizon. To the other side, a mile away, stood a medium-sized town.

Through field-glasses they examined the town. Suburban houses, which were nearest, proved small but attractive and seemed solidly built in brick or stone. No tall buildings arose from the center, the highest having only four floors. The whole place basked in clean air and bright sunshine with no haze or smog above its rooftops. Of mechanical road vehicles there wasn't a sign but from the northern outskirts trailed a long, fluffy line of vapor where a steam-locomotive headed away.

"Well, my dear Captain," enthused the Ambassador, "I must say that this looks lots better than did the last dump." Approvingly he sniffed the invigorating air. "A most attractive place and a worthy addition to our empire."

"Yes, Your Excellency," said Grayder, not bothering to suggest that the inhabitants might have different ideas.

"I'd like it better," put in Shelton, "if they had more manpower and greater industrial potential. Militarily speaking, they are weak. A mutual defense pact will be a one-sided bargain so far as we are concerned."

"No addition to Terran strength is to be despised," contradicted the Ambassador. "Besides, these faraway planets will serve as buffer states and absorb the first blows."

Grayder felt tempted to ask, "From whom?" but held his peace. Within the last few centuries Blieder ships had probed a considerable piece of the cosmos without finding any form of life more intelligent than an Earth-dog. To his mind, all this glib talk about a prospective menace from space was nothing but a pretext to extend authority as far as it could be taken.

Peering through his field-glasses again, the Ambassador said with satisfaction, "Well, the problem of making contact is about to be solved. A couple of people are coming to us through the barley." He registered a gratified smile. "Nice of them to react so promptly."

"It could also be stupid of them," opined Shelton. "How do they know that this is a Terran ship? If they had no more sense than the average hick-which isn't saying much-they'd scout around and make sure of our identity before approaching us."

Still watching the oncomers, of whom nothing could be seen save two heads above the waving grain, the Ambassador replied, "They must have been working nearby when we came down, otherwise they could not have appeared so soon. That means they are agricultural workers. You cannot expect a pair of farmhands to be military geniuses, my dear Colonel."

Shelton subsided, still thinking that wariness was not tog much to ask of anyone, even a hayseed. The group continued to watch while the others made their way carefully through the grain and eventually emerged at the foot of the ridge. Now they started climbing toward the ship.

At that point the Ambassador drooped his field-glasses, rubbed his eyes and blinked several times. Shelton emitted an outraged grunt. Behind him, Sergeant Major Bidworthy rumbled like an active volcano.

Chapter 4.

The Hygeians were very tall, well-built to the point of being over-muscled. Each carried a personal bag slung by a strap from one shoulder. Each was tastefully attired in a pair of sandals, those and nothing more. Apart from the foot gear they were as naked as on the day they were born.

Studying his audience with unconcealed disdain, one gave fraternal greeting by saying, "Terrans-as dirty-minded as ever."

The Ambassador was taking a second look when this observation hit him over the head. He bristled at once.

"What d'you mean?"

"Hiding yourselves from the glorious sunshine and the face of creation," informed the other. Letting his gaze linger significantly upon the ambassadorial belly, he

remarked to his companion, "I suppose it can be conceded that this one has good reason to be ashamed of his body, eh, Pincuff?"

"Yaz," agreed Pincuff. "Years of greed and neglect have taken their toll."

"I resent that," said the Ambassador.

"He resents it, Boogie," said Pincuff. Then he let go a loud and vulgar laugh. His

roving eyes took in the ship, found its ports full of astonished faces. "Look at that

lot, Boogie. Afraid to come out and show themselves. Pale and weedy to a man." "Yaz," Boogie confirmed. "God bless their shrivelled little chests." Then he threw himself flat, did twenty push-ups, sprang to his feet and massaged his bare midriff. "Let's see you do that," he invited the Ambassador.

"For your information, I am the Terran representative and not a circus acrobat."

"You don't say? Then how about doing a mere six up-and-downs?"

"No. Certainly not."

"Just one then," pleaded Boogie. "One for a start. You can always work up to

more. Do you a lot of good."

"I am the sole arbiter of what does me good," declared the Ambassador, holding

his temper grimly in check. "And I have not come here to indulge in pointless calisthenics. I wish to meet someone in a position of authority."

"What for?"

"The purpose is confidential."

"Hear that?" Boogie asked Pincuff, full of suspicion. "There's something smelly

here."

"It' coming from the ship," Pincuff informed. "Full of stale air and old clothing.

Nobody has bathed for months. A real goat's nest."

"The ship air is automatically cleaned and sterilized six times per hour," Grayder told him.

"I should think so, too," approved Pincuff. "Else you could cut it with a knife."

"Real stinkers," Boogie added for good measure. "Probably the only form of life that has found it necessary to invent de-lousing stations."

"And where did you hear about those?" asked the Ambassador coldly.

"We've been educated. We know a lot concerning Terra. Everyone there is dirty- minded about his own body, dirty in physique, dirty in habits. Diseased,

verminous and depraved. Persecutors of anyone who isn't afraid to face the wind, the rain and the sun in his natural state."

"You call that education?"

"Yaz. And it is, too."

Changing his angle of attack, the Ambassador hazarded, "I suppose these are the

orthodox teachings of the Sons of Freedom, eh?"

"Jumping Joseph!" exclaimed Pincuff, horrified. "He thinks we're Doukhobors."

"If you want the Douks," said Boogie contemptuously, "they're way over the hills

playing around in the mud. We drove them out a couple of hundred years ago."

"Why?"

"Couldn't get on with them no matter how we tried. A preaching, praying, mealy-mouthed bunch always trying to convert us to their way of thinking and abusing us when we refused to see the light. They thought that because we Naturists had been victimized for nakedness we must be easy meat. They let us come here with the idea of boosting their own strength. That was their mistake."

"And what happened?"

"We bided our time until we were ready and then we rushed them down south.

Anyone who joins the Douks is mentally deficient. And that's one thing we Naturists are not." He performed a couple of full stretches, danced around and

shadowboxed for half a minute, finished with, "A healthy mind in a healthy body.

Do I speak wisdom, Pincuff?"

"Yaz," said Pincuff.

The Ambassador fished for information. "Do you people outnumber these... er...