you must taste a little of the torture of Tantalus just now. You shall
make up for it afterward.”
And, in truth, there was enough to excite the fancy of a sportsman.
Dick’s heart fairly leaped in his breast as he grasped the butt of his
Purdy.
The fauna of the region were as striking as its flora. The wild-ox
revelled in dense herbage that often concealed his whole body; gray,
black, and yellow elephants of the most gigantic size burst headlong,
like a living hurricane, through the forests, breaking, rending, tearing
down, devastating every thing in their path; upon the woody slopes of
the hills trickled cascades and springs flowing northward; there, too,
the hippopotami bathed their huge forms, splashing and snorting as they
frolicked in the water, and lamantines, twelve feet long, with bodies
like seals, stretched themselves along the banks, turning up toward the
sun their rounded teats swollen with milk.
It was a whole menagerie of rare and curious beasts in a wondrous
hot-house, where numberless birds with plumage of a thousand hues
gleamed and fluttered in the sunshine.
By this prodigality of Nature, the doctor recognized the splendid
kingdom of Adamova.
“We are now beginning to trench upon the realm of modern discovery.
I have taken up the lost scent of preceding travellers. It is a happy
chance, my friends, for we shall be enabled to link the toils of
Captains Burton and Speke with the explorations of Dr. Barth. We
have left the Englishmen behind us, and now have caught up with the
Hamburger. It will not be long, either, before we arrive at the extreme
point attained by that daring explorer.”
“It seems to me that there is a vast extent of country between the two
explored routes,” remarked Kennedy; “at least, if I am to judge by the
distance that we have made.”
“It is easy to determine: take the map and see what is the longitude of
the southern point of Lake Ukereoue, reached by Speke.”
“It is near the thirty-seventh degree.”
“And the city of Yola, which we shall sight this evening, and to which
Barth penetrated, what is its position?”
“It is about in the twelfth degree of east longitude.”
“Then there are twenty-five degrees, or, counting sixty miles to each,
about fifteen hundred miles in all.”
“A nice little walk,” said Joe, “for people who have to go on foot.”
“It will be accomplished, however. Livingstone and Moffat are pushing on
up this line toward the interior. Nyassa, which they have discovered,
is not far from Lake Tanganayika, seen by Burton. Ere the close of the
century these regions will, undoubtedly, be explored. But,” added the
doctor, consulting his compass, “I regret that the wind is carrying us
so far to the westward. I wanted to get to the north.”
After twelve hours of progress, the Victoria found herself on the
confines of Nigritia. The first inhabitants of this region, the Chouas
Arabs, were feeding their wandering flocks. The immense summits of the
Atlantika Mountains seen above the horizon--mountains that no European
foot had yet scaled, and whose height is computed to be ten thousand
feet! Their western slope determines the flow of all the waters in this
region of Africa toward the ocean. They are the Mountains of the Moon to
this part of the continent.
At length a real river greeted the gaze of our travellers, and, by
the enormous ant-hills seen in its vicinity, the doctor recognized the
Benoue, one of the great tributaries of the Niger, the one which the
natives have called “The Fountain of the Waters.”
“This river,” said the doctor to his companions, “will, one day, be the
natural channel of communication with the interior of Nigritia. Under
the command of one of our brave captains, the steamer Pleiad has already
ascended as far as the town of Yola. You see that we are not in an
unknown country.”
Numerous slaves were engaged in the labors of the field, cultivating
sorgho, a kind of millet which forms the chief basis of their diet; and
the most stupid expressions of astonishment ensued as the Victoria sped
past like a meteor. That evening the balloon halted about forty miles
from Yola, and ahead of it, but in the distance, rose the two sharp
cones of Mount Mendif.
The doctor threw out his anchors and made fast to the top of a high
tree; but a very violent wind beat upon the balloon with such force as
to throw it over on its side, thus rendering the position of the car
sometimes extremely dangerous. Ferguson did not close his all night, and
he was repeatedly on the point of cutting the anchor-rope and scudding
away before the gale. At length, however, the storm abated, and the
oscillations of the balloon ceased to be alarming.
On the morrow the wind was more moderate, but it carried our travellers
away from the city of Yola, which recently rebuilt by the Fouillans,
excited Ferguson’s curiosity. However, he had to make up his mind to
being borne farther to the northward and even a little to the east.
Kennedy proposed to halt in this fine hunting-country, and Joe declared
that the need of fresh meat was beginning to be felt; but the savage
customs of the country, the attitude of the population, and some shots
fired at the Victoria, admonished the doctor to continue his journey.
They were then crossing a region that was the scene of massacres and
burnings, and where warlike conflicts between the barbarian sultans,
contending for their power amid the most atrocious carnage, never cease.
Numerous and populous villages of long low huts stretched away
between broad pasture-fields whose dense herbage was besprinkled with
violet-colored blossoms. The huts, looking like huge beehives, were
sheltered behind bristling palisades. The wild hill-sides and hollows
frequently reminded the beholder of the glens in the Highlands of
Scotland, as Kennedy more than once remarked.
In spite of all he could do, the doctor bore directly to the northeast,
toward Mount Mendif, which was lost in the midst of environing clouds.
The lofty summits of these mountains separate the valley of the Niger
from the basin of Lake Tchad.
Soon afterward was seen the Bagele, with its eighteen villages clinging
to its flanks like a whole brood of children to their mother’s bosom--a
magnificent spectacle for the beholder whose gaze commanded and took in
the entire picture at one view. Even the ravines were seen to be covered
with fields of rice and of arachides.
By three o’clock the Victoria was directly in front of Mount Mendif. It
had been impossible to avoid it; the only thing to be done was to cross
it. The doctor, by means of a temperature increased to one hundred and
eighty degrees, gave the balloon a fresh ascensional force of nearly
sixteen hundred pounds, and it went up to an elevation of more than
eight thousand feet, the greatest height attained during the journey.
The temperature of the atmosphere was so much cooler at that point that
the aeronauts had to resort to their blankets and thick coverings.
Ferguson was in haste to descend; the covering of the balloon gave
indications of bursting, but in the meanwhile he had time to satisfy
himself of the volcanic origin of the mountain, whose extinct craters
are now but deep abysses. Immense accumulations of bird-guano gave the
sides of Mount Mendif the appearance of calcareous rocks, and there
was enough of the deposit there to manure all the lands in the United
Kingdom.
At five o’clock the Victoria, sheltered from the south winds, went
gently gliding along the slopes of the mountain, and stopped in a wide
clearing remote from any habitation. The instant it touched the soil,
all needful precautions were taken to hold it there firmly; and Kennedy,
fowling-piece in hand, sallied out upon the sloping plain. Ere long,
he returned with half a dozen wild ducks and a kind of snipe, which Joe
served up in his best style. The meal was heartily relished, and the
night was passed in undisturbed and refreshing slumber.
CHAPTER THIRTIETH.
Mosfeia.--The Sheik.--Denham, Clapperton, and Oudney.--Vogel.--The
Capital of Loggoum.--Toole.--Becalmed above Kernak.--The Governor and
his Court.--The Attack.--The Incendiary Pigeons.
On the next day, May 11th, the Victoria resumed her adventurous journey.
Her passengers had the same confidence in her that a good seaman has in
his ship.
In terrific hurricanes, in tropical heats, when making dangerous
departures, and descents still more dangerous, it had, at all times
and in all places, come out safely. It might almost have been said that
Ferguson managed it with a wave of the hand; and hence, without knowing
in advance, where the point of arrival would be, the doctor had no fears
concerning the successful issue of his journey. However, in this country
of barbarians and fanatics, prudence obliged him to take the strictest
precautions. He therefore counselled his companions to have their eyes
wide open for every thing and at all hours.
The wind drifted a little more to the northward, and, toward nine
o’clock, they sighted the larger city of Mosfeia, built upon an eminence
which was itself enclosed between two lofty mountains. Its position
was impregnable, a narrow road running between a marsh and a thick wood
being the only channel of approach to it.
At the moment of which we write, a sheik, accompanied by a mounted
escort, and clad in a garb of brilliant colors, preceded by couriers
and trumpeters, who put aside the boughs of the trees as he rode up, was
making his grand entry into the place.
The doctor lowered the balloon in order to get a better look at this
cavalcade of natives; but, as the balloon grew larger to their eyes,
they began to show symptoms of intense affright, and at length made off
in different directions as fast as their legs and those of their horses
could carry them.
The sheik alone did not budge an inch. He merely grasped his long
musket, cocked it, and proudly waited in silence. The doctor came on to
within a hundred and fifty feet of him, and then, with his roundest and
fullest voice, saluted him courteously in the Arabic tongue.
But, upon hearing these words falling, as it seemed, from the sky, the
sheik dismounted and prostrated himself in the dust of the highway,
where the doctor had to leave him, finding it impossible to divert him
from his adoration.
“Unquestionably,” Ferguson remarked, “those people take us for
supernatural beings. When Europeans came among them for the first time,
they were mistaken for creatures of a higher race. When this sheik
comes to speak of to-day’s meeting, he will not fail to embellish the
circumstance with all the resources of an Arab imagination. You may,
therefore, judge what an account their legends will give of us some
day.”
“Not such a desirable thing, after all,” said the Scot, “in the point of
view that affects civilization; it would be better to pass for mere men.
That would give these negro races a superior idea of European power.”
“Very good, my dear Dick; but what can we do about it? You might sit
all day explaining the mechanism of a balloon to the savants of this
country, and yet they would not comprehend you, but would persist in
ascribing it to supernatural aid.”
“Doctor, you spoke of the first time Europeans visited these regions.
Who were the visitors?” inquired Joe.
“My dear fellow, we are now upon the very track of Major Denham. It
was at this very city of Mosfeia that he was received by the Sultan of
Mandara; he had quitted the Bornou country; he accompanied the sheik in
an expedition against the Fellatahs; he assisted in the attack on the
city, which, with its arrows alone, bravely resisted the bullets of the
Arabs, and put the sheik’s troops to flight. All this was but a pretext
for murders, raids, and pillage. The major was completely plundered
and stripped, and had it not been for his horse, under whose stomach he
clung with the skill of an Indian rider, and was borne with a headlong
gallop from his barbarous pursuers, he never could have made his way
back to Kouka, the capital of Bornou.”
“Who was this Major Denham?”
“A fearless Englishman, who, between 1822 and 1824, commanded an
expedition into the Bornou country, in company with Captain Clapperton
and Dr. Oudney. They set out from Tripoli in the month of March, reached
Mourzouk, the capital of Fez, and, following the route which at a later
period Dr. Barth was to pursue on his way back to Europe, they arrived,
on the 16th of February, 1823, at Kouka, near Lake Tchad. Denham made
several explorations in Bornou, in Mandara, and to the eastern shores
of the lake. In the mean time, on the 15th of December, 1823, Captain
Clapperton and Dr. Oudney had pushed their way through the Soudan
country as far as Sackatoo, and Oudney died of fatigue and exhaustion in
the town of Murmur.”
“This part of Africa has, therefore, paid a heavy tribute of victims to
the cause of science,” said Kennedy.
“Yes, this country is fatal to travellers. We are moving directly toward
the kingdom of Baghirmi, which Vogel traversed in 1856, so as to reach
the Wadai country, where he disappeared. This young man, at the age of
twenty-three, had been sent to cooperate with Dr. Barth. They met on the
1st of December, 1854, and thereupon commenced his explorations of the
country. Toward 1856, he announced, in the last letters received
from him, his intention to reconnoitre the kingdom of Wadai, which no
European had yet penetrated. It appears that he got as far as Wara, the
capital, where, according to some accounts, he was made prisoner, and,
according to others, was put to death for having attempted to ascend a
sacred mountain in the environs. But, we must not too lightly admit the
death of travellers, since that does away with the necessity of going
in search of them. For instance, how often was the death of Dr. Barth
reported, to his own great annoyance! It is, therefore, very possible
that Vogel may still be held as a prisoner by the Sultan of Wadai, in
the hope of obtaining a good ransom for him.
“Baron de Neimans was about starting for the Wadai country when he
died at Cairo, in 1855; and we now know that De Heuglin has set out on
Vogel’s track with the expedition sent from Leipsic, so that we shall
soon be accurately informed as to the fate of that young and interesting
explorer.” *
* Since the doctor’s departure, letters written from
El’Obeid by Mr. Muntzinger, the newly-appointed head of the
expedition, unfortunately place the death of Vogel beyond a
doubt.
Mosfeia had disappeared from the horizon long ere this, and the Mandara
country was developing to the gaze of our aeronauts its astonishing
fertility, with its forests of acacias, its locust-trees covered with
red flowers, and the herbaceous plants of its fields of cotton and
indigo trees. The river Shari, which eighty miles farther on rolled its
impetuous waters into Lake Tchad, was quite distinctly seen.
The doctor got his companions to trace its course upon the maps drawn by
Dr. Barth.
“You perceive,” said he, “that the labors of this savant have been
conducted with great precision; we are moving directly toward the
Loggoum region, and perhaps toward Kernak, its capital. It was there
that poor Toole died, at the age of scarcely twenty-two. He was a young
Englishman, an ensign in the 80th regiment, who, a few weeks before, had
joined Major Denham in Africa, and it was not long ere he there met
his death. Ah! this vast country might well be called the graveyard of
European travellers.”
Some boats, fifty feet long, were descending the current of the Shari.
The Victoria, then one thousand feet above the soil, hardly attracted
the attention of the natives; but the wind, which until then had been
blowing with a certain degree of strength, was falling off.
“Is it possible that we are to be caught in another dead calm?” sighed
the doctor.
“Well, we’ve no lack of water, nor the desert to fear, anyhow, master,”
said Joe.
“No; but there are races here still more to be dreaded.”
“Why!” said Joe, again, “there’s something like a town.”
“That is Kernak. The last puffs of the breeze are wafting us to it, and,
if we choose, we can take an exact plan of the place.”
“Shall we not go nearer to it?” asked Kennedy.
“Nothing easier, Dick! We are right over it. Allow me to turn the
stopcock of the cylinder, and we’ll not be long in descending.”
Half an hour later the balloon hung motionless about two hundred feet
from the ground.
“Here we are!” said the doctor, “nearer to Kernak than a man would be to
London, if he were perched in the cupola of St. Paul’s. So we can take a
survey at our ease.”
“What is that tick-tacking sound that we hear on all sides?”
Joe looked attentively, and at length discovered that the noise they
heard was produced by a number of weavers beating cloth stretched in the
open air, on large trunks of trees.
The capital of Loggoum could then be seen in its entire extent, like
an unrolled chart. It is really a city with straight rows of houses
and quite wide streets. In the midst of a large open space there was a
slave-market, attended by a great crowd of customers, for the Mandara
women, who have extremely small hands and feet, are in excellent
request, and can be sold at lucrative rates.
At the sight of the Victoria, the scene so often produced occurred
again. At first there were outcries, and then followed general
stupefaction; business was abandoned; work was flung aside, and
all noise ceased. The aeronauts remained as they were, completely
motionless, and lost not a detail of the populous city. They even went
down to within sixty feet of the ground.
Hereupon the Governor of Loggoum came out from his residence, displaying
his green standard, and accompanied by his musicians, who blew on hoarse
buffalo-horns, as though they would split their cheeks or any thing
else, excepting their own lungs. The crowd at once gathered around him.
In the mean while Dr. Ferguson tried to make himself heard, but in vain.
This population looked like proud and intelligent people, with their
high foreheads, their almost aquiline noses, and their curling hair; but
the presence of the Victoria troubled them greatly. Horsemen could be
seen galloping in all directions, and it soon became evident that the
governor’s troops were assembling to oppose so extraordinary a foe. Joe
wore himself out waving handkerchiefs of every color and shape to them;
but his exertions were all to no purpose.
However, the sheik, surrounded by his court, proclaimed silence, and
pronounced a discourse, of which the doctor could not understand a word.
It was Arabic, mixed with Baghirmi. He could make out enough, however,
by the universal language of gestures, to be aware that he was receiving
a very polite invitation to depart. Indeed, he would have asked for
nothing better, but for lack of wind, the thing had become impossible.
His noncompliance, therefore, exasperated the governor, whose courtiers
and attendants set up a furious howl to enforce immediate obedience on
the part of the aerial monster.
They were odd-looking fellows those courtiers, with their five or six
shirts swathed around their bodies! They had enormous stomachs, some
of which actually seemed to be artificial. The doctor surprised his
companions by informing them that this was the way to pay court to
the sultan. The rotundity of the stomach indicated the ambition of its
possessor. These corpulent gentry gesticulated and bawled at the top of
their voices--one of them particularly distinguishing himself above
the rest--to such an extent, indeed, that he must have been a prime
minister--at least, if the disturbance he made was any criterion of his
rank. The common rabble of dusky denizens united their howlings with
the uproar of the court, repeating their gesticulations like so many
monkeys, and thereby producing a single and instantaneous movement of
ten thousand arms at one time.
To these means of intimidation, which were presently deemed
insufficient, were added others still more formidable. Soldiers, armed
with bows and arrows, were drawn up in line of battle; but by this time
the balloon was expanding, and rising quietly beyond their reach. Upon
this the governor seized a musket and aimed it at the balloon; but,
Kennedy, who was watching him, shattered the uplifted weapon in the
sheik’s grasp.
At this unexpected blow there was a general rout. Every mother’s son
of them scampered for his dwelling with the utmost celerity, and stayed
there, so that the streets of the town were absolutely deserted for the
remainder of that day.
Night came, and not a breath of wind was stirring. The aeronauts had to
make up their minds to remain motionless at the distance of but three
hundred feet above the ground. Not a fire or light shone in the deep
gloom, and around reigned the silence of death; but the doctor only
redoubled his vigilance, as this apparent quiet might conceal some
snare.
And he had reason to be watchful. About midnight, the whole city seemed
to be in a blaze. Hundreds of streaks of flame crossed each other, and
shot to and fro in the air like rockets, forming a regular network of
fire.
“That’s really curious!” said the doctor, somewhat puzzled to make out
what it meant.
“By all that’s glorious!” shouted Kennedy, “it looks as if the fire were
ascending and coming up toward us!”
And, sure enough, with an accompaniment of musket-shots, yelling, and
din of every description, the mass of fire was, indeed, mounting toward
the Victoria. Joe got ready to throw out ballast, and Ferguson was not
long at guessing the truth. Thousands of pigeons, their tails garnished
with combustibles, had been set loose and driven toward the Victoria;
and now, in their terror, they were flying high up, zigzagging the
atmosphere with lines of fire. Kennedy was preparing to discharge all
his batteries into the middle of the ascending multitude, but what could
he have done against such a numberless army? The pigeons were already
whisking around the car; they were even surrounding the balloon,
the sides of which, reflecting their illumination, looked as though
enveloped with a network of fire.
The doctor dared hesitate no longer; and, throwing out a fragment of
quartz, he kept himself beyond the reach of these dangerous assailants;
and, for two hours afterward, he could see them wandering hither and
thither through the darkness of the night, until, little by little,
their light diminished, and they, one by one, died out.
“Now we may sleep in quiet,” said the doctor.
“Not badly got up for barbarians,” mused friend Joe, speaking his
thoughts aloud.
“Oh, they employ these pigeons frequently, to set fire to the thatch
of hostile villages; but this time the village mounted higher than they
could go.”
“Why, positively, a balloon need fear no enemies!”
“Yes, indeed, it may!” objected Ferguson.
“What are they, then, doctor?”
“They are the careless people in the car! So, my friends, let us have
vigilance in all places and at all times.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIRST.
Departure in the Night-time.--All Three.--Kennedy’s
Instincts.--Precautions.--The Course of the Shari River.--Lake
Tchad.--The Water of the Lake.--The Hippopotamus.--One Bullet thrown
away.
About three o’clock in the morning, Joe, who was then on watch, at
length saw the city move away from beneath his feet. The Victoria was
once again in motion, and both the doctor and Kennedy awoke.
The former consulted his compass, and saw, with satisfaction, that the
wind was carrying them toward the north-northeast.
“We are in luck!” said he; “every thing works in our favor: we shall
discover Lake Tchad this very day.”
“Is it a broad sheet of water?” asked Kennedy.
“Somewhat, Dick. At its greatest length and breadth, it measures about
one hundred and twenty miles.”
“It will spice our trip with a little variety to sail over a spacious
sheet of water.”
“After all, though, I don’t see that we have much to complain of on that
score. Our trip has been very much varied, indeed; and, moreover, we are
getting on under the best possible conditions.”
“Unquestionably so; excepting those privations on the desert, we have
encountered no serious danger.”
“It is not to be denied that our noble balloon has behaved wonderfully
well. To-day is May 12th, and we started on the 18th of April. That
makes twenty-five days of journeying. In ten days more we shall have
reached our destination.”
“Where is that?”
“I do not know. But what does that signify?”
“You are right again, Samuel! Let us intrust to Providence the care of
guiding us and of keeping us in good health as we are now. We don’t look
much as though we had been crossing the most pestilential country in the
world!”
“We had an opportunity of getting up in life, and that’s what we have
done!”
“Hurrah for trips in the air!” cried Joe. “Here we are at the end of
twenty-five days in good condition, well fed, and well rested. We’ve had
too much rest in fact, for my legs begin to feel rusty, and I wouldn’t
be vexed a bit to stretch them with a run of thirty miles or so!”
“You can do that, Joe, in the streets of London, but in fine we set
out three together, like Denham, Clapperton, and Overweg; like Barth,
Richardson, and Vogel, and, more fortunate than our predecessors here,
we are three in number still. But it is most important for us not to
separate. If, while one of us was on the ground, the Victoria should
have to ascend in order to escape some sudden danger, who knows whether
we should ever see each other again? Therefore it is that I say again to
Kennedy frankly that I do not like his going off alone to hunt.”
“But still, Samuel, you will permit me to indulge that fancy a little.
There is no harm in renewing our stock of provisions. Besides, before
our departure, you held out to me the prospect of some superb hunting,
and thus far I have done but little in the line of the Andersons and
Cummings.”
“But, my dear Dick, your memory fails you, or your modesty makes you
forget your own exploits. It really seems to me that, without mentioning
small game, you have already an antelope, an elephant, and two lions on
your conscience.”
“But what’s all that to an African sportsman who sees all the animals
in creation strutting along under the muzzle of his rifle? There! there!
look at that troop of giraffes!”
“Those giraffes,” roared Joe; “why, they’re not as big as my fist.”
“Because we are a thousand feet above them; but close to them you would
discover that they are three times as tall as you are!”
“And what do you say to yon herd of gazelles, and those ostriches, that
run with the speed of the wind?” resumed Kennedy.
“Those ostriches?” remonstrated Joe, again; “those are chickens, and the
greatest kind of chickens!”
“Come, doctor, can’t we get down nearer to them?” pleaded Kennedy.
“We can get closer to them, Dick, but we must not land. And what good
will it do you to strike down those poor animals when they can be of no
use to you? Now, if the question were to destroy a lion, a tiger, a cat,
a hyena, I could understand it; but to deprive an antelope or a gazelle
of life, to no other purpose than the gratification of your instincts as
a sportsman, seems hardly worth the trouble. But, after all, my friend,
we are going to keep at about one hundred feet only from the soil, and,
should you see any ferocious wild beast, oblige us by sending a ball
through its heart!”
The Victoria descended gradually, but still keeping at a safe height,
for, in a barbarous, yet very populous country, it was necessary to keep
on the watch for unexpected perils.
The travellers were then directly following the course of the Shari. The
charming banks of this river were hidden beneath the foliage of trees of
various dyes; lianas and climbing plants wound in and out on all sides
and formed the most curious combinations of color. Crocodiles were seen
basking in the broad blaze of the sun or plunging beneath the waters
with the agility of lizards, and in their gambols they sported about
among the many green islands that intercept the current of the stream.
It was thus, in the midst of rich and verdant landscapes that our
travellers passed over the district of Maffatay, and about nine o’clock
in the morning reached the southern shore of Lake Tchad.
There it was at last, outstretched before them, that Caspian Sea of
Africa, the existence of which was so long consigned to the realms of
fable--that interior expanse of water to which only Denham’s and Barth’s
expeditions had been able to force their way.
The doctor strove in vain to fix its precise configuration upon paper.
It had already changed greatly since 1847. In fact, the chart of Lake
Tchad is very difficult to trace with exactitude, for it is surrounded
by muddy and almost impassable morasses, in which Barth thought that
he was doomed to perish. From year to year these marshes, covered with
reeds and papyrus fifteen feet high, become the lake itself. Frequently,
too, the villages on its shores are half submerged, as was the case with
Ngornou in 1856, and now the hippopotamus and the alligator frisk and
dive where the dwellings of Bornou once stood.
The sun shot his dazzling rays over this placid sheet of water, and
toward the north the two elements merged into one and the same horizon.
The doctor was desirous of determining the character of the water, which
was long believed to be salt. There was no danger in descending close to
the lake, and the car was soon skimming its surface like a bird at the
distance of only five feet.
Joe plunged a bottle into the lake and drew it up half filled. The water
was then tasted and found to be but little fit for drinking, with a
certain carbonate-of-soda flavor.
While the doctor was jotting down the result of this experiment, the
loud report of a gun was heard close beside him. Kennedy had not been
able to resist the temptation of firing at a huge hippopotamus. The
latter, who had been basking quietly, disappeared at the sound of the
explosion, but did not seem to be otherwise incommoded by Kennedy’s
conical bullet.
“You’d have done better if you had harpooned him,” said Joe.
“But how?”
“With one of our anchors. It would have been a hook just big enough for
such a rousing beast as that!”
“Humph!” ejaculated Kennedy, “Joe really has an idea this time--”
“Which I beg of you not to put into execution,” interposed the doctor.
“The animal would very quickly have dragged us where we could not have
done much to help ourselves, and where we have no business to be.”
“Especially now since we’ve settled the question as to what kind of
water there is in Lake Tchad. Is that sort of fish good to eat, Dr.
Ferguson?”
“That fish, as you call it, Joe, is really a mammiferous animal of the
pachydermal species. Its flesh is said to be excellent and is an article
of important trade between the tribes living along the borders of the
lake.”
“Then I’m sorry that Mr. Kennedy’s shot didn’t do more damage.”
“The animal is vulnerable only in the stomach and between the thighs.
Dick’s ball hasn’t even marked him; but should the ground strike me as
favorable, we shall halt at the northern end of the lake, where Kennedy
will find himself in the midst of a whole menagerie, and can make up for
lost time.”
“Well,” said Joe, “I hope then that Mr. Kennedy will hunt the
hippopotamus a little; I’d like to taste the meat of that queer-looking
beast. It doesn’t look exactly natural to get away into the centre of
Africa, to feed on snipe and partridge, just as if we were in England.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SECOND.
The Capital of Bornou.--The Islands of the Biddiomahs.--The
Condors.--The Doctor’s Anxieties.--His Precautions.--An Attack
in Mid-air.--The Balloon Covering torn.--The Fall.--Sublime
Self-Sacrifice.--The Northern Coast of the Lake.
Since its arrival at Lake Tchad, the balloon had struck a current that
edged it farther to the westward. A few clouds tempered the heat of the
day, and, besides, a little air could be felt over this vast expanse of
water; but about one o’clock, the Victoria, having slanted across this
part of the lake, again advanced over the land for a space of seven or
eight miles.
The doctor, who was somewhat vexed at first at this turn of his course,
no longer thought of complaining when he caught sight of the city of
Kouka, the capital of Bornou. He saw it for a moment, encircled by
its walls of white clay, and a few rudely-constructed mosques
rising clumsily above that conglomeration of houses that look like
playing-dice, which form most Arab towns. In the court-yards of
the private dwellings, and on the public squares, grew palms and
caoutchouc-trees topped with a dome of foliage more than one hundred
feet in breadth. Joe called attention to the fact that these immense
parasols were in proper accordance with the intense heat of the sun, and
made thereon some pious reflections which it were needless to repeat.
Kouka really consists of two distinct towns, separated by the “Dendal,”
a large boulevard three hundred yards wide, at that hour crowded with
horsemen and foot passengers. On one side, the rich quarter stands
squarely with its airy and lofty houses, laid out in regular order; on
the other, is huddled together the poor quarter, a miserable collection
of low hovels of a conical shape, in which a poverty-stricken multitude
vegetate rather than live, since Kouka is neither a trading nor a
commercial city.
Kennedy thought it looked something like Edinburgh, were that city
extended on a plain, with its two distinct boroughs.
But our travellers had scarcely the time to catch even this glimpse of
it, for, with the fickleness that characterizes the air-currents of this
region, a contrary wind suddenly swept them some forty miles over the
surface of Lake Tchad.
Then then were regaled with a new spectacle. They could count the
numerous islets of the lake, inhabited by the Biddiomahs, a race of
bloodthirsty and formidable pirates, who are as greatly feared when
neighbors as are the Touaregs of Sahara.
These estimable people were in readiness to receive the Victoria bravely
with stones and arrows, but the balloon quickly passed their islands,
fluttering over them, from one to the other with butterfly motion, like
a gigantic beetle.
At this moment, Joe, who was scanning the horizon, said to Kennedy:
“There, sir, as you are always thinking of good sport, yonder is just
the thing for you!”
“What is it, Joe?”
“This time, the doctor will not disapprove of your shooting.”
“But what is it?”
“Don’t you see that flock of big birds making for us?”
“Birds?” exclaimed the doctor, snatching his spyglass.
“I see them,” replied Kennedy; “there are at least a dozen of them.”
“Fourteen, exactly!” said Joe.
“Heaven grant that they may be of a kind sufficiently noxious for the
doctor to let me peg away at them!”
“I should not object, but I would much rather see those birds at a
distance from us!”
“Why, are you afraid of those fowls?”
“They are condors, and of the largest size. Should they attack us--”
“Well, if they do, we’ll defend ourselves. We have a whole arsenal at
our disposal. I don’t think those birds are so very formidable.”
“Who can tell?” was the doctor’s only remark.
Ten minutes later, the flock had come within gunshot, and were making
the air ring with their hoarse cries. They came right toward the
Victoria, more irritated than frightened by her presence.
“How they scream! What a noise!” said Joe.
“Perhaps they don’t like to see anybody poaching in their country up in
the air, or daring to fly like themselves!”
“Well, now, to tell the truth, when I take a good look at them, they are
an ugly, ferocious set, and I should think them dangerous enough if they
were armed with Purdy-Moore rifles,” admitted Kennedy.
“They have no need of such weapons,” said Ferguson, looking very grave.
The condors flew around them in wide circles, their flight growing
gradually closer and closer to the balloon. They swept through the
air in rapid, fantastic curves, occasionally precipitating themselves
headlong with the speed of a bullet, and then breaking their line of
projection by an abrupt and daring angle.
The doctor, much disquieted, resolved to ascend so as to escape this
dangerous proximity. He therefore dilated the hydrogen in his balloon,
and it rapidly rose.
But the condors mounted with him, apparently determined not to part
company.
“They seem to mean mischief!” said the hunter, cocking his rifle.
And, in fact, they were swooping nearer, and more than one came within
fifty feet of them, as if defying the fire-arms.
“By George, I’m itching to let them have it!” exclaimed Kennedy.
“No, Dick; not now! Don’t exasperate them needlessly. That would only be
exciting them to attack us!”
“But I could soon settle those fellows!”
“You may think so, Dick. But you are wrong!”
“Why, we have a bullet for each of them!”
“And suppose that they were to attack the upper part of the balloon,
what would you do? How would you get at them? Just imagine yourself in
the presence of a troop of lions on the plain, or a school of sharks
in the open ocean! For travellers in the air, this situation is just as
dangerous.”
“Are you speaking seriously, doctor?”
“Very seriously, Dick.”
“Let us wait, then!”
“Wait! Hold yourself in readiness in case of an attack, but do not fire
without my orders.”
The birds then collected at a short distance, yet to near that their
naked necks, entirely bare of feathers, could be plainly seen, as they
stretched them out with the effort of their cries, while their gristly
crests, garnished with a comb and gills of deep violet, stood erect with
rage. They were of the very largest size, their bodies being more
than three feet in length, and the lower surface of their white wings
glittering in the sunlight. They might well have been considered winged
sharks, so striking was their resemblance to those ferocious rangers of
the deep.
“They are following us!” said the doctor, as he saw them ascending with
him, “and, mount as we may, they can fly still higher!”
“Well, what are we to do?” asked Kennedy.
The doctor made no answer.
“Listen, Samuel!” said the sportsman. “There are fourteen of those
birds; we have seventeen shots at our disposal if we discharge all our
weapons. Have we not the means, then, to destroy them or disperse them?
I will give a good account of some of them!”
“I have no doubt of your skill, Dick; I look upon all as dead that may
come within range of your rifle, but I repeat that, if they attack the
upper part of the balloon, you could not get a sight at them. They would
tear the silk covering that sustains us, and we are three thousand feet
up in the air!”
At this moment, one of the ferocious birds darted right at the balloon,
with outstretched beak and claws, ready to rend it with either or both.
“Fire! fire at once!” cried the doctor.
He had scarcely ceased, ere the huge creature, stricken dead, dropped
headlong, turning over and over in space as he fell.
Kennedy had already grasped one of the two-barrelled fowling-pieces and
Joe was taking aim with another.
Frightened by the report, the condors drew back for a moment, but they
almost instantly returned to the charge with extreme fury. Kennedy
severed the head of one from its body with his first shot, and Joe broke
the wing of another.
“Only eleven left,” said he.
Thereupon the birds changed their tactics, and by common consent soared
above the balloon. Kennedy glanced at Ferguson. The latter, in spite
of his imperturbability, grew pale. Then ensued a moment of terrifying
silence. In the next they heard a harsh tearing noise, as of something
rending the silk, and the car seemed to sink from beneath the feet of
our three aeronauts.
“We are lost!” exclaimed Ferguson, glancing at the barometer, which was
now swiftly rising.
“Over with the ballast!” he shouted, “over with it!”
And in a few seconds the last lumps of quartz had disappeared.
“We are still falling! Empty the water-tanks! Do you hear me, Joe? We
are pitching into the lake!”
Joe obeyed. The doctor leaned over and looked out. The lake seemed to
come up toward him like a rising tide. Every object around grew rapidly
in size while they were looking at it. The car was not two hundred feet
from the surface of Lake Tchad.
“The provisions! the provisions!” cried the doctor.
And the box containing them was launched into space.
Their descent became less rapid, but the luckless aeronauts were still
falling, and into the lake.
“Throw out something--something more!” cried the doctor.
“There is nothing more to throw!” was Kennedy’s despairing response.
“Yes, there is!” called Joe, and with a wave of the hand he disappeared
like a flash, over the edge of the car.
“Joe! Joe!” exclaimed the doctor, horror-stricken.
The Victoria thus relieved resumed her ascending motion, mounted
a thousand feet into the air, and the wind, burying itself in the
disinflated covering, bore them away toward the northern part of the
lake.
“Lost!” exclaimed the sportsman, with a gesture of despair.
“Lost to save us!” responded Ferguson.
And these men, intrepid as they were, felt the large tears streaming
down their cheeks. They leaned over with the vain hope of seeing some
trace of their heroic companion, but they were already far away from
him.
“What course shall we pursue?” asked Kennedy.
“Alight as soon as possible, Dick, and then wait.”
After a sweep of some sixty miles the Victoria halted on a desert shore,
on the north of the lake. The anchors caught in a low tree and the
sportsman fastened it securely. Night came, but neither Ferguson nor
Kennedy could find one moment’s sleep.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THIRD.
Conjectures.--Reestablishment of the Victoria’s Equilibrium.--Dr.
Ferguson’s New Calculations.--Kennedy’s Hunt.--A Complete Exploration of
Lake Tchad.--Tangalia.--The Return.--Lari.
On the morrow, the 13th of May, our travellers, for the first time,
reconnoitred the part of the coast on which they had landed. It was a
sort of island of solid ground in the midst of an immense marsh. Around
this fragment of terra firma grew reeds as lofty as trees are in Europe,
and stretching away out of sight.
These impenetrable swamps gave security to the position of the balloon.
It was necessary to watch only the borders of the lake. The vast stretch
of water broadened away from the spot, especially toward the east, and
nothing could be seen on the horizon, neither mainland nor islands.
The two friends had not yet ventured to speak of their recent companion.
Kennedy first imparted his conjectures to the doctor.
“Perhaps Joe is not lost after all,” he said. “He was a skilful lad,
and had few equals as a swimmer. He would find no difficulty in swimming
across the Firth of Forth at Edinburgh. We shall see him again--but how
and where I know not. Let us omit nothing on our part to give him the
chance of rejoining us.”
“May God grant it as you say, Dick!” replied the doctor, with much
emotion. “We shall do everything in the world to find our lost friend
again. Let us, in the first place, see where we are. But, above all
things, let us rid the Victoria of this outside covering, which is of
no further use. That will relieve us of six hundred and fifty pounds, a
weight not to be despised--and the end is worth the trouble!”
The doctor and Kennedy went to work at once, but they encountered great
difficulty. They had to tear the strong silk away piece by piece, and
then cut it in narrow strips so as to extricate it from the meshes of
the network. The tear made by the beaks of the condors was found to be
several feet in length.
This operation took at least four hours, but at length the inner balloon
once completely extricated did not appear to have suffered in the least
degree. The Victoria was thus diminished in size by one fifth, and this
difference was sufficiently noticeable to excite Kennedy’s surprise.
“Will it be large enough?” he asked.
“Have no fears on that score, I will reestablish the equilibrium, and
should our poor Joe return we shall find a way to start off with him
again on our old route.”
“At the moment of our fall, unless I am mistaken, we were not far from
an island.”
“Yes, I recollect it,” said the doctor, “but that island, like all the
islands on Lake Tchad, is, no doubt, inhabited by a gang of pirates and
murderers. They certainly witnessed our misfortune, and should Joe fall
into their hands, what will become of him unless protected by their
superstitions?”
“Oh, he’s just the lad to get safely out of the scrape, I repeat. I have
great confidence in his shrewdness and skill.”
“I hope so. Now, Dick, you may go and hunt in the neighborhood, but
don’t get far away whatever you do. It has become a pressing necessity
for us to renew our stock of provisions, since we had to sacrifice
nearly all the old lot.”
“Very good, doctor, I shall not be long absent.”
Hereupon, Kennedy took a double-barrelled fowling-piece, and strode
through the long grass toward a thicket not far off, where the frequent
sound of shooting soon let the doctor know that the sportsman was making
a good use of his time.
Meanwhile Ferguson was engaged in calculating the relative weight of the
articles still left in the car, and in establishing the equipoise of the
second balloon. He found that there were still left some thirty pounds
of pemmican, a supply of tea and coffee, about a gallon and a half of
brandy, and one empty water-tank. All the dried meat had disappeared.
The doctor was aware that, by the loss of the hydrogen in the first
balloon, the ascensional force at his disposal was now reduced to about
nine hundred pounds. He therefore had to count upon this difference in
order to rearrange his equilibrium. The new balloon measured sixty-seven
thousand cubic feet, and contained thirty-three thousand four hundred
and eighty feet of gas. The dilating apparatus appeared to be in good
condition, and neither the battery nor the spiral had been injured.
The ascensional force of the new balloon was then about three thousand
pounds, and, in adding together the weight of the apparatus, of the
passengers, of the stock of water, of the car and its accessories, and
putting aboard fifty gallons of water, and one hundred pounds of fresh
meat, the doctor got a total weight of twenty-eight hundred and thirty
pounds. He could then take with him one hundred and seventy pounds of
ballast, for unforeseen emergencies, and the balloon would be in exact
balance with the surrounding atmosphere.
His arrangements were completed accordingly, and he made up for Joe’s
weight with a surplus of ballast. He spent the whole day in these
preparations, and the latter were finished when Kennedy returned. The
hunter had been successful, and brought back a regular cargo of geese,
wild-duck, snipe, teal, and plover. He went to work at once to draw and
smoke the game. Each piece, suspended on a small, thin skewer, was hung
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