Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 1.djvu/267

 3,000 feet, and for that the doctor had only to raise the temperature eighteen degrees. It might be said that he worked the balloon with his hand. Kennedy warned him of the obstacles to avoid, and the "Victoria" rose through the air skimming past the mountain.

At eight o'clock they descended on the opposite side, but the descent was slower than the ascent. The grapnels were cast out, and one after the other came in contact with the branches of an enormous Indian fig, where they fastened themselves. Then Joe let himself slip down by the cord and secured the balloon as firmly as possible. The silk ladder was then thrown to him, and he reascended briskly. The balloon remained almost motionless, shaded from the wind.

The evening meal was prepared. The travelers, with appetites excited by their aerial trip, made a great hole in their provisions.

"What distance have we made to-day?" asked Kennedy, while masticating some troublesome morsels.

The doctor ascertained the day's work by means of lunar observations, and consulted the excellent map which served him as a guide—it was part of the atlas published in Gotha by his friend Petermann, which he had sent to him. This atlas would serve the doctor for the whole journey, for it contained the route of Burton and Speke to the great lakes, that to the Soudan undertaken by Barth, to the lower Senegal by William Lejean, and to the delta of the Niger by Dr. Baike.

Ferguson also possessed a book which contained all the speculations written respecting the Nile, and entitled, "The Sources of the Nile; being a general survey of the basin of that river, and of its head stream, with the history of the Nilotic discovery. By Charles Beke, D.D."

He also had the excellent maps published in the Transactions of the Royal Geographical Society of London, so any point of the country hitherto discovered could not now escape him.

Following the map, he found that the latitudinal route had been two degrees, or 120 miles, to the west. Kennedy remarked that the route turned towards the north; this direction satisfied the doctor, who wished as soon as possible to follow up the tracks of his predecessors.