Page:A thousand years hence. Being personal experiences (IA thousandyearshen00gree).djvu/410

 and aloft, fixed upon the grand "spot" opening which had lately yawned in a position so conveniently direct for us. At once he springs the first electric, and, with a rather smart shock all round, away we speed. The arousing effects of the shock, the pleasant excitement, the reassuring aspect of redoubtable old White at the helm near me, and, above all, the pleasant parental feeling that we were now homeward bound, had at last quite dispelled my cross humour in the tantalizing matter of the dream. Bullings' welcome communication also did its part; so that, altogether, I found myself lapsing into a very comfortable complacency of spirit, as I glanced, alternately, downwards upon the vast and diversified solar scenery we were so rapidly leaving, and upwards at the electrical storms and storm-clouds of the sub-photosphere, which we were as rapidly approaching.

Suddenly I mark a change in White's expression, and looking in the direction indicated by his fixed and keen gaze, I at once apprehend the cause; for a bright facula is just then seen streaming out from the edge towards the centre of the opening in the photosphere for which we are making. It now occurred to me to suggest to White, that, perhaps, we had better pull up, or even make a timely turn back, in face of such manifest danger. Hardly was the thought realized, when I saw the bold, rash man pull the second electric, and on we dashed at the redoubled speed, while the terrible shaking I got in consequence seemed to leave me, for a second or two, but half alive.

But I quickly recovered myself, under the pressure of imminent surrounding danger. Looking out ahead,