"Well, not to get into a tiresome discourse, as Professor Herron would say, I shall make this description very rudimentary," said Paul, with a smile.  "During a total eclipse of the sun in India in 1868, Lockyer, a British astronomer, saw in the spectroscope a bright, yellow line of light around the sun.  He called it _helium_, after the Greek word for sun.  So much for him.  Twenty-seven years later an element was found on earth in natural-gas in Kansas, which gave the same bright, yellow light viewed through the spectrum.  The people, finding it would not burn, disgustedly let millions of barrels of this valuable element escape into the air, before a scientist told them that it was of untold value for balloon and airship purposes.  It is thought the gas comes from radium deposits.  It has never been found in any country except the United States, and only here in Kansas and northern Texas, where it occurs in sands from 14,000 to 16,000 feet deep.  Our government is now securing about 50,000 cubic feet of helium per day, refusing to sell it to foreign countries, as it is all needed here, besides which it might be used against us in case of another war."