either of sight or of hearing, as we know these senses. The Lens has also many other highly important uses, which lack of space forbids even mentioning here.

Having the Lens, it was an easy matter for the Patrol to purify itself of its few unworthy members. Standards of entrance were raised higher and higher; and, as it became evident that it was to a man incorruptible, it was granted more and ever more authority.

Now its power is practically unlimited; the Lensman can follow the lawbreaker, wherever he may go. He can commandeer any material or assistance, whenever and wherever required. The Lens is so respected throughout the Galactic Union that any wearer of it may at any time be called upon to act as judge, jury, and executioner. Wherever he goes, throughout the Universe of Civilization, he not only carries the law with him—he is the law.

How are these Lensmen chosen? An Earthman myself, and proud of the fact that Tellus was the cradle of Galactic Civilization, I will describe only how Tellurian Lensmen are selected. Upon other planets the methods and means vary widely; but the results are the same: Wherever he may be found or however monstrous he may appear, a Lensman is always a Lensman.

Each year one million boys are picked, by competitive examination, from all the eighteen-year-olds of Earth. During the first year of training, before any of them set foot inside Wentworth Hall, that number shrinks to less than fifty thousand. Then, for four years more, they are put through the most poignantly searching, the most pitilessly rigid process of elimination possible to develop, during the course of which every man who can be made to reveal any sign of unworthiness or of weakness is dropped. Of each class, only about a hundred win through to the Lens; but each of those few has proven repeatedly, to the cold verge of death itself, that he is in every sense fit to wear it.

Of those who drop out alive, most are dismissed from the Patrol. There are many splendid men, however, who for some reason not involving moral turpitude are not quite what a Lensman must be. These men make up the organization, from grease monkeys up to the highest commissioned officers below the rank of Lensman. This fact explains what is already so widely known: that the Galactic Patrol is the finest body of intelligent beings yet to serve under one banner.

But even Lensmen are not all alike; some are more richly endowed than others. Most Lensmen work more or less under direction; that is, they have headquarters and, at the completion of one 

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