Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 1.djvu/390

 visioning of the balloon. In many places he perceived the tracks of rhinoceros, manatees, and hippopotomi, but he never encountered any of these formidable beasts.

At seven in the morning, and not without great difficulty, which poor Joe would have made light of, the grapnel was detached from the tree. The gas was dilated, and the new "Victoria" ascended 200 feet into the air. After some coquetting with the wind, it fell in with a pretty strong current, and sailed over the lake, and was soon progressing at twenty miles an hour.

The doctor steadily maintained an elevation of between 200 and 500 feet. Kennedy often discharged his carbine. The travelers even approached imprudently near to the islands, examining the coppices, the brushwood, the bushes, and every shaded place, in which their late companion could have found shelter, then descended close to the long pirogues which skimmed over the lake. The fishermen on their approach threw themselves into the water, and swam to the island with every demonstration of terror.

"We can discover nothing," said Kennedy, after a search of two hours.

"Patience, Dick; let us not be discouraged, we cannot be very distant from the scene of the accident."

At eleven o'clock the "Victoria" had made ninety miles; it then encountered a new current, which carried it at almost right angles to its previous course for sixty miles towards the east. It hovered over a large and thickly-inhabited island, which the doctor pronounced to be Fanam, the capital of the Biddiomahs. They were in hopes to see Joe rise out of each bush, escaping and calling to them for assistance. If free, they could have taken him up without any difficulty; if a prisoner, they must put the same plan in practice to rescue him as they had for the missionary's release. He would soon have rejoined his friends, but nothing appeared, nothing was stirring. They were beginning to despair.

At half-past two the "Victoria" came in sight of Tangalia, a village situated upon the eastern side of the Tchad, and which was the extreme point attained by Denham in his expedition.

The doctor became uneasy at this persistent direction of the wind. He felt he was being driven towards the east,