Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 1.djvu/397

 Poor Joe, he gave a last thought to his master, and began to fight desperately, but felt himself drawn, not towards the bottom of the lake, as crocodiles have the habit of doing to devour their prey, but to the surface. Scarcely had he drawn breath and opened his eyes, than he perceived two negroes, of an ebony hue; these Africans held him tightly and uttered strange cries.

"Hollo!" cried Joe. "Niggers instead of crocodiles. Faith, I prefer the former. But how do these fellows dare to bathe in such places as this?"

Joe forgot that the inhabitants of the islands on the lake, like all black people, can bathe with impunity in water swarming with alligators without heeding them. The amphibious inhabitants of this lake have a great reputation for being inoffensive saurians.

But Joe was only "out of the frying-pan into the fire." He determined to wait the issue of events, and as he could not do otherwise, he permitted himself to be conducted to the bank without displaying any fear.

"Evidently," thought he, these people have seen the 'Victoria' skimming the lake like an aërial monster; they have been distant witnesses of my fall, and they cannot but feel respect for a man who has fallen from Heaven. Let them go on."

Joe was reflecting thus when he was landed in the midst of a shouting crowd of both sexes and all ages, but not of every color. He was with a tribe of Biddiomahs of a splendid black tint. There was no reason for him to blush, even at the lightness of his clothing; he was in "deshabille," the latest fashion of the country.

But ere he had time to take in all the situation he could not mistake the adoration of which he became the object.

This fact did not reassure him, when the affair of Kazeh recurred to his memory.

"I see that I am about to become a god—a son of the Moon perhaps. Well, that will do as well as any other when there is no choice. What is necessary is to gain time. If the 'Victoria' happens to pass, I will profit by my new position to give my worshipers a view of a miraculous apotheosis."

While Joe was thus reflecting the crowd was assembling round him; they prostrated themselves, they shouted, they