CHAPTER FOUR.
THE NOVEL BEGINNING OF A SINGULAR VOYAGE.
On reaching the head of the spiral staircase the professor paused for amoment to direct the attention of his companions to a long passage whichextended apparently along the middle of the ship to the fore-end of thesuperstructure. The passage was about five feet wide, and the ceilingwas of ground glass, through which a flood of light streamed brilliantlydown.
"In that direction," said the professor, "are to be found, first, thekitchen, pantry, larder, and store-room; then next to them come mylaboratory and workshop, with the armoury and magazine on the oppositeside; then the quarters of the cook and the valet; next these again arethe bath-rooms and lavatories; and finally, at the extreme end of thepassage, there are the state-rooms or sleeping apartments, eight innumber--four for ourselves and four spare ones."
George, the valet--whose duties, however, on board the _Flying Fish_were to be rather those of steward and general handy man--stood duringthe progress of this brief explanation with his hand on the handle ofthe saloon door; and now, as the professor turned and nodded, he flungthe door wide open and stood aside for the baronet and his friends toenter.
They now found themselves in the dining-saloon, an apartment thirty feetsquare and about ten feet high to the lower edge of the cornice. Thewalls, of unpainted aethereum, were broken up into panels by flutedpilasters with richly-moulded capitals, each panel having a frostedborder covered with delicate tracery, whilst the central portion of thepanel was left plain and polished, serving the purpose of a mirror, inwhich the room and its multiplied reflections on the opposite wall wasagain reflected in a long perspective. The floor was covered with arich Turkey carpet, into which one sank ankle deep; the chairs, sofas,the massive sideboard, the wide table, in fact all the furniture in theroom, was constructed of aethereum and modelled after the choicestdesigns, the upholstery being in rich embossed velvet of a delicatelight-blue shade. The table glittered with a brilliant array of plateand glass; and the entire apartment was suffused with rich, soft,rainbow-tinted light, streaming down through the magnificent covedskylight of stained glass, which served instead of ceiling to thesaloon.
"Superb!"
"Magnificent!"
"Exquisite!"
Such were the exclamations which burst from the professor's companionsas they paused to look about them and take in all the details of thesplendidly furnished and decorated apartment. A dozen eager questionsrushed from their lips; but Herr von Schalckenberg was hungry, and thedinner was served, he therefore contented himself with bowing profoundlyand pointing to the dinner-table.
"Come, gentlemen," exclaimed the baronet laughingly, "take your seats, Ibeg. It is evident that we have quite exhausted both the professor'spatience and his strength, and that we shall get no more information outof him until both have been restored by a good dinner."
With which remark Sir Reginald set the example by taking his place atthe head of the table, as he was entitled to do in virtue of hisownership of the _Flying Fish_.
The dinner was an admirable one, in all respects quite worthy theexceptional nature of the occasion; and under its genial influence, andthat of the choice wines which accompanied it, the conversation soongrew extremely animated. The topic was, of course, the aerial ship andthe novel and interesting character of her various equipments. Theprofessor speedily redeemed his afternoon's promise to the baronet, andat length succeeded in completely convincing that hitherto scepticalindividual that, so far from the enormous proportions of the _FlyingFish_ being detrimental to her, they constituted the principal basisupon which he was justified in his anticipations of her success as an_aerial_ ship.
Having at length made this perfectly plain, he was next called upon byLieutenant Mildmay to explain a certain peculiarity in the binnaclecompass, which had attracted that gentleman's notice and excited hiscuriosity.
"I observed," he said, "that the compass-card bore round its outer rim,at every quarter point, a small upright needle. As everything on boardhere, however apparently insignificant, seems to have its own especialpurpose, I should like to know the purpose which those small needles aredesigned to serve."
"Ha, ha, my friend! so you noticed them, did you? I quite expectedthat, as a seaman, you very soon would," said the professor. "Well, Iwill tell you what they are. They form part of a little device of mineto render the ship self-steering, or, more correctly, to make thecompass itself steer her in any given direction. Having noticed thoseneedles, you doubtless also noticed that across the `lubber's mark'there was a small slit some six inches long in the side of the compass-box?"
The lieutenant nodded.
"Good!" ejaculated the professor. "Had you looked outside the box youwould also have observed two long slender arms pivoted close together,their outer and longer extremities being united, and carrying a smallneedle which travels, point downwards, along the arc of a circle. Nowthe action of the instrument is this. Supposing that you wish the shipto travel along, say, a southerly course, you manipulate the helm in theusual manner until the south point of the compass-card swings round tothe lubber's mark. The moment that these two accurately coincide youpull toward you a small lever within easy reach of your hand, and thetwo arms glide in through the slit in the side of the compass-box,passing one on each side of the needle on the edge of the card, and yourapparatus is then connected up ready for action. Now, so long as theship's bows remain pointed accurately to the south, the south point onthe compass-card continues coincident with the lubber's mark, andnothing happens. But should the ship deviate ever so slightly from herproper course the heavy, yet sensitive, compass needle at once swingsround in sympathy; the small needle on the edge of the card moves thetwo slender arms which embrace it; the downward-pointing needle at thefurther extremity of these arms travels along the arc; and electriccommunication is at once established with the steering machinery, whichpromptly acts in such a way as to bring back the ship to her originalcourse."
"Capital! Admirable!" ejaculated Sir Reginald and the lieutenanttogether, the former continuing:
"Upon my word, professor, you are a veritable wizard--a magician withpowers exceeding those of the most potent of your brethren referred toin the `Arabian Nights.'"
The professor made a laughing disclaimer. "No, no, my dear sir," saidhe, "I am no magician, but only a poor scientist. Nevertheless, thewonders of science far exceed those of the `Arabian Nights,' and willwell repay the man who cares to patiently study them."
Enlivened by conversation of a character so interesting to all present,the sitting was prolonged to quite an inordinate length, and though noone, except perhaps the professor, noted the fact, it was past midnightwhen the adventurous quartette rose from the table, and taking theirwine and cigars with them, moved into the music-room, at the same timedismissing the patient George for the night.
The music-room was a much larger apartment than the dining saloon,being, like the latter, the full width of the superstructure, andmeasuring forty feet between the fore and the after bulkheads. It wasthe next room abaft the dining saloon, and was even more elaboratelyfurnished and decorated than the latter. The walls, divided up in thesame manner as those of the other apartment, were adorned with choicepictures, and exquisite statues of frosted aethereum were grouped onpedestals at frequent intervals all round the room. A coved andpanelled ceiling of decorated aethereum sprang from the upper edge ofthe richly moulded cornice; and a skylight of magnificent stained glass,somewhat similar to that of the dining saloon, surmounted the whole. Agrand piano and a noble chamber organ, both in superbly modelledaethereum cases, occupied opposite sides of the apartment; a veryhandsome clock, with a set of silvery chimes for the quarters and a deeprich-toned gong for the hours, occupied a conspicuous position on a wallbracket; chairs, couches, and divans of seductive shape and amplecapacity were dotted here and there about the rich carpet; and ahandsome table occupied the centre of the room, supporting andreflecting in the silvery depths of it
s undraped top a noble epergne ofchoice hot-house flowers.
"Why, how is this?" exclaimed the colonel as he sank into the luxuriousdepths of a most inviting arm-chair; "my watch must be all wrong, andyour clock there is also wrong, professor; they both assert that it ishalf-past twelve o'clock, yet the sun has not yet set," pointing aloftto the skylight, through which a brilliant flood of sunshine wasstreaming down into the magnificent apartment.
"The sun has not yet set? Then we will soon make it do so," laughinglyremarked the professor, rising from his seat and approaching one of thewalls of the apartment, whilst the baronet and the lieutenant stared indismay at their own watch-faces. The German began to manipulate acouple of tiny knobs which occupied unobtrusive positions in the base ofone of the pilasters, and the sunlight gradually deepened into a richorange hue, then changed to a soft pearly grey, which gradually deepenedinto a dim delicious twilight in which little was visible save thepictured glass in the skylight above; then it gradually brightenedagain, and presently a flood of glorious silvery moonlight streamed downthrough the skylight and suffused the room. Finally, with aninstantaneous change, the brilliant sunlight was again restored."Another wonder!" exclaimed Sir Reginald. "How do you manage it,professor?"
"Oh! that is a very simple matter," was the reply; "it is merely acunning arrangement of variously tinted glass shades interposed betweenthe electric light above the centre of the skylight and the mirrorswhich reflect the light down through the stained glass into the room.As you probably noticed when on the deck, there are no actual skylightsin the usual acceptation of the term; ours are only make-believes; butthey struck me as affording an agreeable means of lighting the saloons,so I introduced them."
In further conversation, diversified by music, the time slipped rapidlyaway; and at length the clock on the bracket proclaimed that it was twohours after midnight.
As the sonorous strokes of the gong announced the fact, the professorrose to his feet, and in a voice tremulous with sudden nervousexcitement, said:
"Gentlemen, the hour for our departure, the hour which is to witness thesuccess or failure of our grand experiment, has arrived. The river andthe streets of the great city are by this time nearly or quite deserted;and we may therefore hope that our movements will attract little or nonotice. Are you ready?"
"Ready!" ejaculated the baronet; "of course we are, my dear sir. Is notthis the moment to which we have all been anxiously looking forward formore than two years? Proceed, professor, we will follow you; andwhatever orders you may give us shall be obeyed to the letter."
"Come, then," said the professor; and he led the way through the diningsaloon and up the grand staircase to the lower compartment of the pilot-house, and thence out on deck.
To their eyes, fresh from the brilliantly lighted saloons, the nightappeared intensely dark; but in a minute or two, becoming accustomed tothe gloom, they were able to perceive that the ladder had been takenaway from the ship's side, and also that the contractor had completedhis task of removing the planking at the river end of the shed, thusclearing a way for the exit of the great ship. They walked to the afterextremity of the deck, and from that point were not only able, in thebreathless stillness then prevailing, to distinctly hear the gurgle andrush of the river, but also to dimly make out the shining, swirlingsurface of the water as the flood-tide swept past them.
"The air is absolutely motionless," said the professor. "No morefavourable moment could possibly have been chosen for the difficult taskof moving the _Flying Fish_ out of her present cramped quarters, and wewill at once avail ourselves of it. Lieutenant, I will ask you toreturn here presently on the `look-out,' as you sailors term it. Yourduty will be to see that when we move out of the shed we do not comeinto collision with anything. Perhaps you, colonel, will kindly go tothe other end the deck, also on the `look-out;' and, as for you, SirReginald, I must ask you to stand on the deck just outside thepilothouse, to see that the electric lamp on the top of it does not comeinto collision with the roof-timbers, and so drag the roof off the shed.But as it is necessary that you should all become acquainted with theworking of the ship, you had better be with me in the pilot-house untilwe are actually ready to move."
"Now," continued the professor when the quartette had made their way tothe upper floor of the pilot-house, which was moderately illuminated byan electric lamp of small power, "the first thing to be done is to placethe tiller of the ship in a horizontal position, and thus bring intoaction the automatic balancing gear. So! It is done. The next thingis to expel the air from the entire hull of the ship, excepting, ofcourse, the comparatively insignificant portion reserved for habitation,and this I do by injecting vapour into the several compartments. Thevapour drives out the air, and then, condensing like steam, creates, ifrequired, a perfect vacuum. This large wheel controls the valve whichwe now want to open. I turn it this way, so--and now we shall see whatwill happen."
Two large dials were attached to the side of the pilothouse, closetogether; and upon these the professor now intently fixed his gaze. Theindex-hands of both were seen to be moving. A period of perhaps half aminute elapsed, and then the professor, suddenly shutting off thevapour, went over and closely inspected both dials.
"Good!" he exclaimed, after a single keen glance at each of them."Gentlemen, let us congratulate each other. Our experiment is a SIGNALSUCCESS!"
"How do you know that, professor? How can you tell?" eagerly asked hiscompanions.
"Look at these two dials; they will tell you," replied the professor."This dial," tapping one with his finger, "indicates the weight of theship, or the pressure with which she bears upon the ground. This one,"indicating the other, "shows the pressure of air inside the hull of theship. The first, as you see, shows that the ship is now pressing uponthe ground with a force of less than a single ton--in other words, shenow weighs less than one ton. The air-gauge shows that there is stillan air pressure of six pounds per square inch inside the hull, and wetherefore have, as I expected we should, a large margin of buoyancy.Now, lieutenant, do me the favour to turn on the vapour once more, verycautiously. Steady! _Stop_! There, Sir Reginald, the index hasreached zero, and your ship is now as nearly as possible without weight;and if a man were now underneath her, he might, notwithstanding hergigantic proportions, easily raise her upon his shoulders. Now comesthe delicate part of our operation. To your stations on the deckquickly, gentlemen, if you please."
The professor's companions, just a trifle excited, perhaps, hurried awayto their posts, and the scientist was left alone. The circular windowsin the sides of the pilothouse were all left open, and in through thempresently floated the voice of the lieutenant shouting:
"All ready abaft, professor."
"All ready at this end," replied the colonel.
The professor reversed the engines, turned on the vapour _very_cautiously indeed, and simultaneously, with the engines below only justbarely moving, the huge propeller began to whirl round at a speed ofsome sixty revolutions a minute.
A breathless pause of perhaps two seconds followed, and then theprofessor, his forehead damp with nervous perspiration, heard:
"Hurrah! She's away!" from the lieutenant.
"She moves; she moves!" from the colonel.
And, "By Jove, she is actually moving!" from the baronet.
Slowly but surely the _Flying Fish_ backed out of the building-shed,until nearly half her immense length projected beyond the walls. Thenthe voice of the baronet was heard exclaiming:
"Ho! stop her! The electric lamp will not clear the roof, I am afraid.Can you give us a little light on the subject, professor?"
By way of reply the professor pressed a knob, and the lamp itselfflashed its dazzling light upon the scene, when it became apparent thatthe ship had gradually risen from the ground, bringing the top of herlamp just above the level of the last tie-rod of the roof.
"Can you drop her a little? Six inches will do it," said the baronet.
The professor opened
the air-valve and the ship at once began to settledown.
"So! That will do; all clear. You may go astern again now as fast asyou please," said the baronet.
Once more the great propeller began to revolve, and presently thebaronet, from his position under the foremost end of the pilot-house,remarked:
"Now she is all clear, professor; the whole of the pilothouse is outsidethe shed. A bold dash astern now and we shall be clear fore and aft inanother moment."
The professor extinguished the electric lamp; gave the wheel connectedwith the vapour-valve another turn; the engines increased their speed;and the great ship at once shot rapidly out over the stream and clear ofeverything. Then the professor stopped the engines, turned a thinstream of vapour into the air chambers, and the huge fabric began toslowly rise perpendicularly in the air. Herr von Schalckenberg waiteduntil he saw that they were fairly above the level of the roofs on bothsides of the river; then he left the pilot-house and, joining thebaronet on the deck outside, said, in a voice of undisguised exultation:
"Well, Sir Reginald, what think you _now_ of the _Flying Fish_?"
"I think her, professor, a wonderful creation of a still more wonderfulman. I see that we are steadily rising in the air, as you assured uswould be the case, but I cannot yet fully realise the fact; I feel likea man in a dream; you must give me time to become familiar with this newmarvel--this new triumph of science. But there can no longer be anydoubt as to the success of your labours; and I accordingly offer you mymost hearty thanks and congratulations."
The colonel and the lieutenant also hastened to offer theirs, and thenthe whole party sauntered to the side, and, leaning upon the guard-railwhich took the place of bulwarks, stood gazing upon the scene below.Not that there was very much to see; the sky was obscured by a thinalmost motionless canopy of cloud, and the moon, in her last quarter,had not yet risen; the darkness was therefore profound. At the sametime it was novel and interesting to watch how, as the huge ship rosesteadily higher in the air, the long lines of lighted gas-lamps instreet after street became visible, until gradually the whole of thegreat city lay spread out below them like a map, with the thoroughfaresindicated by faint twinkling lines of fire. And, as they continued torise, the various disjointed sounds which, even at that early hour,pervaded the city, began to reach their ears: the rumbling of a wagon orthe rattle of a cab over the stone-paved streets, the barking of a dog,the crow of some unnaturally wakeful rooster, the clank of shuntingtrucks at one or another of the many goods stations dotted here andthere all over the metropolis, the distant whistle and rattle of a trainspeeding along in the open country beyond; all floated up to them withalmost startling distinctness at first, then fainter and fainter, untilat length they died completely away as the _Flying Fish_ graduallyattained a higher altitude. Then they entered the bank of cloud whichoverspread the city, and the air, which had hitherto been warm, becamesuddenly chill and damp.
"Now, my friends," said the professor, "there will be little or nothingmore to see until we again descend; I therefore propose that we returnto the pilot-house, shut ourselves in, and at once test the soaringpowers of the ship by rising to the highest attainable altitude."
"Agreed!" said the baronet. "But why shut ourselves in?"
"Because," answered the professor, "it will not only grow rapidly colderas we rise, but, if we remain outside, we shall also find itincreasingly difficult to breathe as we reach the more rarefied air;whereas, by remaining inside, we shall be sheltered from the cold andshall be able to breathe the denser air which we shall take up with us."
They accordingly entered the pilot-house, shutting the door after them,and closing all the windows; then the professor turned a full jet ofvapour into the air-chambers for a moment, producing a perfect vacuumtherein, and the ship at once began to mount into the ether with greatlyaccelerated speed, as they could easily see by watching the barometer,the bulb of which, completely protected, was situate outside the wallsof the pilot-house.
It was no very easy matter for cold to penetrate through the thin yetobdurate walls of the pilot-house; but by the time that the barometerhad fallen to fifteen inches the voyagers experienced a distinctsensation of chilliness, whilst the windows of the pilot-house werethickly coated with a delicate frost tracery. Still the barometercontinued to fall steadily, though not so rapidly as at first,indicating that the ship was still soaring upward; and with every inchfall of the mercury the professor became an increasingly interestingstudy of mingled delight and anxiety. At length the mercury, stillfalling, registered a height of eleven inches only, and the professorgave vent to a great sigh of relief. And when it further dropped to teninches he could no longer contain himself.
"Gentlemen," he exclaimed, "rejoice with me. The conquest of themountains is ours. We are now as nearly as possible on a level with thetopmost peak of Everest, the most lofty projection on the earth'ssurface; and in due time I hope we shall have the unique felicity ofplanting our feet on that as yet untrodden spot, and of leaving a recordto that effect behind us."
At length the mercury fell to a little below eight inches, and there itstopped; the limit of the _Flying Fish's_ buoyancy was reached.
The professor stood intently regarding the barometer tube for some time;then he turned and said to his companions:
"Gentlemen, behold the indisputably lowest reading of the barometerwhich man has ever witnessed, and which indicates that we are at thismoment farther from our mother earth than mortal has ever journeyedbefore. Humboldt and Bonpland ascended Chimborazo to a height ofeighteen thousand five hundred and seventy-six feet. Gay-Lussac rose inhis balloon to the much higher elevation of twenty-three thousand feet,only to be eclipsed by your own countryman, Green, who soared to theastounding height of twenty-seven thousand six hundred feet. But it wasleft for _us_, my friends, to achieve the crowning feat of aeronauticalscience, by attaining to the extraordinary altitude of thirty-fourthousand six hundred feet, or more than six and a half miles ofperpendicular elevation above the sea-level. _Now_, Sir Reginald, whatthink you of your latest acquisition, the _Flying Fish_?"
"I think her by far the most wonderful creation of which I have everheard or read, and," (with a bow to the professor) "every way worthy ofthe truly remarkable man to whom she owes her existence. If her powerto penetrate the hitherto unexplored depths of the ocean is at allcommensurate with her ability to reach the higher regions of the air, Iforesee that our voyage is likely to be fruitful in startling incidentand in the discovery of many hitherto unsuspected secrets of nature.Now, what do you propose that we shall next do, professor?"
"I propose," said von Schalckenberg, "that, having tested the _FlyingFish's_ capabilities of merely rising into the air, we should nowascertain what she can do in the way of _navigating_ the atmosphere;after which we will try her powers as a submarine ship. The lowestdepression in the English Channel is to be found in a submarine valleycalled the `Hurd Deep;' it is situate about six miles north of the`Casquets,' and lies ninety-four fathoms (or five hundred and sixty-fourfeet) below the surface of the water. I propose (subject to yourapproval) to make for this spot and there sink to the bottom, takingadvantage of our presence there to make a first trial of our divingarmour. Does this meet with your approval?"
The baronet and his companions thought it a very capital idea, and theprofessor took immediate steps for carrying it out. Opening a case heproduced therefrom a chart of the English Channel, and, directing hiscompanions' attention to the spot which he proposed to visit, requestedLieutenant Mildmay to lay off the course and measure the distance in astraight line. The latter was found to be about one hundred and fiftymiles.
"Which distance," remarked the professor, "I expect we shall accomplish,in the present calm state of the atmosphere, in about an hour and aquarter. This high rate of speed will necessitate our remaining in thepilothouse; but it will, perhaps, be worth while to put up with thattemporary inconvenience on the present occasion, since we have soexceptionally favourable a
n opportunity of testing the actual speed ofthe ship through the air. If, however, you prefer to be on deck in theopen air, we can of course moderate our speed sufficiently to rendersuch a mode of travelling pleasant."
It was unanimously decided, however, to remain inside and give the speedof the ship a fair trial. The professor accordingly turned the vapourinto the engines, slowly at first, but in gradually increasing volume,until they were revolving at full speed, and the ship's head was pointedin the proper direction, the automatic steering gear being at the sametime thrown into action to test its capabilities. This done theprofessor opened the main air-valve, gradually admitting a certainquantity of air into the ship's interior, and she at once began to droponce more earthward.
"We will descend to within about a thousand feet of the sea level," saidthe professor. "This will restore us to a more genial temperature, willgive the propeller a denser atmosphere in which to work, and will alsoenable us to see somewhat of the country over which we are flying;whilst our elevation will be ample to take us clear of everything.Leith Hill, nine hundred and sixty-seven feet in height, is the greatestelevation at all near our path; but we shall pass some three miles or soto the westward of it, if the air remains calm; and Saint Catherine'sPoint, over which we shall pass, is only seven hundred and seventy-fivefeet high. So that we have nothing to fear."
In a few minutes the _Flying Fish_ had dropped to within the proposeddistance of the earth; and, on clearing the windows of the accumulatedfrost, it was discovered that the moon (then in her third quarter) hadrisen and was suffusing the earth with her feeble ghostly light, which,slight as it was, enabled the voyagers to perceive that they wereskimming through the air at a tremendous speed. The engines, thoughworking at their full power, were perfectly noiseless; and thepropeller, though revolving at a rate of fully one thousand revolutionsper minute, caused not the slightest perceptible vibration in the hullof the ship. A loud humming sound, however, proceeded from it, audibleeven above the rush of the air against the sides of the pilot-house.
Leith Hill was soon passed, the waters of the Channel--distinguished inthe faint light only by a thin tremulous line of glimmering silver underthe crescent moon--were sighted, and, almost before they had time torealise the fact, they had skimmed over the anchorage at Spithead,across the Isle of Wight, and were floating above the waters of theChannel. By this time the eastern sky had begun to pale perceptiblybefore the coming dawn; the lights of Saint Catherine behind them andthe Casquets ahead gleamed with steadily diminishing power in thegathering daylight; the half-dozen or so of ships and steamers in sight,one after the other extinguished their signal lamps; and, just as theyreached their destination and settled lightly as a snow-flake upon theglassy surface of the water, up rose the glorious sun, flashing hisbrilliant beams over land and sea, and awakening all nature into lightand life once more.
As the _Flying Fish_ alighted on the surface of the water, the professorpulled out his watch and remarked, with evident satisfaction:
"One hundred and fifty miles in just one hour and a quarter! That isgood travelling, and proves the speed of our ship to be exactly what Iestimated it would be. We will now set the force-pump to work; and Ihope, that by the time we are ready to descend, that brilliant sun willhave enshrouded our movements in a concealing mist. We are surroundedby fishing-boats, as you see, and I have no doubt that we have also beenobserved by the light-keepers on the Casquets. It will never do todisappear before so many curious eyes; they would be filled with horrorat the supposed catastrophe. In the meantime we may as well go out ondeck to enjoy the fresh morning air. As for me, I propose to indulge inthe luxury of a swim."
The main engines had, in the meantime, been stopped, and the force-pumpput slowly in motion, so that the submersion of the hull might besufficiently gradual to escape notice.
Five minutes later the professor and his three companions weregambolling round the ship like so many porpoises--or dolphins, if theywould prefer the latter metaphor--enjoying to the full the invigoratingluxury of their bath in the cool, pure sea-water.
By the time that they were on board again and dressed, the intelligentGeorge had arranged for them on deck a nice little light breakfast ofchocolate, biscuits, and fruit, for which their swim had given them anunbounded relish. The meal was partaken of at leisure, and followed bya cigar, over which they dawdled so long that the _Flying Fish_ wassubmerged to the deck before the last stump had been reluctantly thrownaway. The mist which the professor had prognosticated having,meanwhile, gathered sufficiently to cloak their movements, a cast of thelead was taken and the ship was found to be in ninety fathoms of water.The professor, for reasons of his own, deemed this sufficiently near thedeepest point to justify an immediate descent. They accordingly enteredthe pilot-house forthwith, closing the door securely after them--theair-pump was stopped, the sea-cock communicating with the water-chamberswas opened, and the _Flying Fish_, with an easy imperceptible motion,sank gently beneath the placid waters, to rest, a minute or two later,on a bed of gravel at the bottom of the Channel.
"Now," said the professor, looking at his watch when the ship had fairlysettled into her strange berth, and had been securely anchored there,"it is just eight o'clock. We are all somewhat fatigued, and our bathand breakfast have prepared us nicely to enjoy a few hours' repose. Itherefore propose, gentlemen, that we retire to our sleeping apartmentsuntil two o'clock p.m. George shall call us at that hour and have a bitof luncheon ready for us, after which we shall have ample time to testour diving apparatus before dinner."
This proposal met with a very cordial reception, and was duly carriedout, with the result that, half an hour later, the four adventurousvoyagers were sleeping as calmly in their novel resting-place as thoughthey had been accustomed from their earliest infancy to take theirrepose at the bottom of the sea.