Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 1.djvu/378

 The imprudent people whom it carries in its car; so, my friends, vigilance above everything—vigilance always!"

three o'clock in the morning, during Joe's watch, the town appeared to move beneath them, and the "Victoria" sailed away. Kennedy and the doctor awoke.

The latter consulted the compass, and perceived with satisfaction that the wind was bearing them to the nor-nor-east.

"We are getting on capitally," said he. "All goes well, and we shall come in sight of Lake Tchad this very day."

"Is it a large expanse of water?" asked Kennedy.

"A very considerable size, my dear Dick; at its greatest length and breadth it measures 120 miles."

"It will be a little change for us to sail over such a sheet of water."

"Well, it seems to me that we have nothing to grumble at; the country is very varied, and we are enjoying it under the most pleasant conditions."

"No doubt, Samuel. Except the privations of the desert we have not encountered any serious danger."

"Certainly, our tight little 'Victoria' has behaved wonderfully. To-day is the 12th of May; we started on the 18th of April, so we have been traveling twenty-five days. Ten days more and we shall reach the end of our journey."

"Where?"

"I do not know; but what does that matter?"

"You are right, Samuel; let us trust in Providence to take care of us and keep us in good health, as we are. We do not look much like people who have been traversing the most pestilential country in the world."

"We have been able to keep up so high, that is the reason we have been so well."

"Hurrah for aërial traveling!" cried Joe. "Here we are after twenty-five days, in good health, well fed, well rested; indeed, rather too well rested, for my limbs are getting stiff, and I should not be sorry to take the stiffness off with a thirty mile walk."