Chapter Chapter 37 · The Western Route.—Joe wakes up.—His Obstinacy.—End of Joe’s

. The Western Route.—Joe wakes up.—His Obstinacy.—End of Joe’s

Narrative.—Tagelei.—Kennedy’s Anxieties.—The Route to the North.—A

Night near Aghades.

During the night the wind lulled as though reposing after the

boisterousness of the day, and the _Victoria_ remained quietly at the

top of the tall sycamore. The doctor and Kennedy kept watch by turns,

and Joe availed himself of the chance to sleep most sturdily for

twenty-four hours at a stretch.

“That’s the remedy he needs,” said Dr. Ferguson. “Nature will take

charge of his care.”

With the dawn the wind sprang up again in quite strong, and moreover

capricious gusts. It shifted abruptly from south to north, but finally

the _Victoria_ was carried away by it toward the west.

The doctor, map in hand, recognized the kingdom of Damerghou, an

undulating region of great fertility, in which the huts that compose

the villages are constructed of long reeds interwoven with branches of

the _asclepia_. The grain-mills were seen raised in the cultivated

fields, upon small scaffoldings or platforms, to keep them out of the

reach of the mice and the huge ants of that country.

They soon passed the town of Zinder, recognized by its spacious place

of execution, in the centre of which stands the “tree of death.” At its

foot the executioner stands waiting, and whoever passes beneath its

shadow is immediately hung!

Upon consulting his compass, Kennedy could not refrain from saying:

“Look! we are again moving northward.”

“No matter; if it only takes us to Timbuctoo, we shall not complain.

Never was a finer voyage accomplished under better circumstances!”

“Nor in better health,” said Joe, at that instant thrusting his jolly

countenance from between the curtains of the awning.

“There he is! there’s our gallant friend—our preserver!” exclaimed

Kennedy, cordially.—“How goes it, Joe?”

“Oh! why, naturally enough, Mr. Kennedy, very naturally! I never felt

better in my life! Nothing sets a man up like a little pleasure-trip

with a bath in Lake Tchad to start on—eh, doctor?”

“Brave fellow!” said Ferguson, pressing Joe’s hand, “what terrible

anxiety you caused us!”

“Humph! and you, sir? Do you think that I felt easy in my mind about

you, gentlemen? You gave me a fine fright, let me tell you!”

“We shall never agree in the world, Joe, if you take things in that

style.”

“I see that his tumble hasn’t changed him a bit,” added Kennedy.

“Your devotion and self-forgetfulness were sublime, my brave lad, and

they saved us, for the _Victoria_ was falling into the lake, and, once

there, nobody could have extricated her.”

“But, if my devotion, as you are pleased to call my summerset, saved

you, did it not save me too, for here we are, all three of us, in

first-rate health? Consequently we have nothing to squabble about in

the whole affair.”

“Oh! we can never come to a settlement with that youth,” said the

sportsman.

“The best way to settle it,” replied Joe, “is to say nothing more about

the matter. What’s done is done. Good or bad, we can’t take it back.”

“You obstinate fellow!” said the doctor, laughing; “you can’t refuse,

though, to tell us your adventures, at all events.”

“Not if you think it worth while. But, in the first place, I’m going to

cook this fat goose to a turn, for I see that Mr. Kennedy has not

wasted his time.”

“All right, Joe!”

“Well, let us see then how this African game will sit on a European

stomach!”

The goose was soon roasted by the flame of the blow-pipe, and not long

afterward was comfortably stowed away. Joe took his own good share,

like a man who had eaten nothing for several days. After the tea and

the punch, he acquainted his friends with his recent adventures. He

spoke with some emotion, even while looking at things with his usual

philosophy. The doctor could not refrain from frequently pressing his

hand when he saw his worthy servant more considerate of his master’s

safety than of his own, and, in relation to the sinking of the island

of the Biddiomahs, he explained to him the frequency of this phenomenon

upon Lake Tchad.

At length Joe, continuing his recital, arrived at the point where,

sinking in the swamp, he had uttered a last cry of despair.

“I thought I was gone,” said he, “and as you came right into my mind, I

made a hard fight for it. How, I couldn’t tell you—but I’d made up my

mind that I wouldn’t go under without knowing why. Just then, I saw—two

or three feet from me—what do you think? the end of a rope that had

been fresh cut; so I took leave to make another jerk, and, by hook or

by crook, I got to the rope. When I pulled, it didn’t give; so I pulled

again and hauled away and there I was on dry ground! At the end of the

rope, I found an anchor! Ah, master, I’ve a right to call that the

anchor of safety, anyhow, if you have no objection. I knew it again! It

was the anchor of the _Victoria!_ You had grounded there! So I followed

the direction of the rope and that gave me your direction, and, after

trying hard a few times more, I got out of the swamp. I had got my

strength back with my spunk, and I walked on part of the night away

from the lake, until I got to the edge of a very big wood. There I saw

a fenced-in place, where some horses were grazing, without thinking of

any harm. Now, there are times when everybody knows how to ride a

horse, are there not, doctor? So I didn’t spend much time thinking

about it, but jumped right on the back of one of those innocent animals

and away we went galloping north as fast as our legs could carry us. I

needn’t tell you about the towns that I didn’t see nor the villages

that I took good care to go around. No! I crossed the ploughed fields;

I leaped the hedges; I scrambled over the fences; I dug my heels into

my nag; I thrashed him; I fairly lifted the poor fellow off his feet!

At last I got to the end of the tilled land. Good! There was the

desert. ‘That suits me!’ said I, ‘for I can see better ahead of me and

farther too.’ I was hoping all the time to see the balloon tacking

about and waiting for me. But not a bit of it; and so, in about three

hours, I go plump, like a fool, into a camp of Arabs! Whew! what a hunt

that was! You see, Mr. Kennedy, a hunter don’t know what a real hunt is

until he’s been hunted himself! Still I advise him not to try it if he

can keep out of it! My horse was so tired, he was ready to drop off his

legs; they were close on me; I threw myself to the ground; then I

jumped up again behind an Arab! I didn’t mean the fellow any harm, and

I hope he has no grudge against me for choking him, but I saw you—and

you know the rest. The _Victoria_ came on at my heels, and you caught

me up flying, as a circus-rider does a ring. Wasn’t I right in counting

on you? Now, doctor, you see how simple all that was! Nothing more

natural in the world! I’m ready to begin over again, if it would be of

any service to you. And besides, master, as I said a while ago, it’s

not worth mentioning.”

“My noble, gallant Joe!” said the doctor, with great feeling. “Heart of

gold! we were not astray in trusting to your intelligence and skill.”

“Poh! doctor, one has only just to follow things along as they happen,

and he can always work his way out of a scrape! The safest plan, you

see, is to take matters as they come.”

While Joe was telling his experience, the balloon had rapidly passed

over a long reach of country, and Kennedy soon pointed out on the

horizon a collection of structures that looked like a town. The doctor

glanced at his map and recognized the place as the large village of

Tagelei, in the Damerghou country.

“Here,” said he, “we come upon Dr. Barth’s route. It was at this place

that he parted from his companions, Richardson and Overweg; the first

was to follow the Zinder route, and the second that of Maradi; and you

may remember that, of these three travellers, Barth was the only one

who ever returned to Europe.”

“Then,” said Kennedy, following out on the map the direction of the

_Victoria_, “we are going due north.”

“Due north, Dick.”

“And don’t that give you a little uneasiness?”

“Why should it?”

“Because that line leads to Tripoli, and over the Great Desert.”

“Oh, we shall not go so far as that, my friend—at least, I hope not.”

“But where do you expect to halt?”

“Come, Dick, don’t you feel some curiosity to see Timbuctoo?”

“Timbuctoo?”

“Certainly,” said Joe; “nobody nowadays can think of making the trip to

Africa without going to see Timbuctoo.”

“You will be only the fifth or sixth European who has ever set eyes on

that mysterious city.”

“Ho, then, for Timbuctoo!”

“Well, then, let us try to get as far as between the seventeenth and

eighteenth degrees of north latitude, and there we will seek a

favorable wind to carry us westward.”

“Good!” said the hunter. “But have we still far to go to the

northward?”

“One hundred and fifty miles at least.”

“In that case,” said Kennedy, “I’ll turn in and sleep a bit.”

“Sleep, sir; sleep!” urged Joe. “And you, doctor, do the same yourself:

you must have need of rest, for I made you keep watch a little out of

time.”

The sportsman stretched himself under the awning; but Ferguson, who was

not easily conquered by fatigue, remained at his post.

In about three hours the _Victoria_ was crossing with extreme rapidity

an expanse of stony country, with ranges of lofty, naked mountains of

granitic formation at the base. A few isolated peaks attained the

height of even four thousand feet. Giraffes, antelopes, and ostriches

were seen running and bounding with marvellous agility in the midst of

forests of acacias, mimosas, souahs, and date-trees. After the

barrenness of the desert, vegetation was now resuming its empire. This

was the country of the Kailouas, who veil their faces with a bandage of

cotton, like their dangerous neighbors, the Touaregs.

At ten o’clock in the evening, after a splendid trip of two hundred and

fifty miles, the _Victoria_ halted over an important town. The

moonlight revealed glimpses of one district half in ruins; and some

pinnacles of mosques and minarets shot up here and there, glistening in

the silvery rays. The doctor took a stellar observation, and discovered

that he was in the latitude of Aghades.

This city, once the seat of an immense trade, was already falling into

ruin when Dr. Barth visited it.

The _Victoria_, not being seen in the obscurity of night, descended

about two miles above Aghades, in a field of millet. The night was

calm, and began to break into dawn about three o’clock A.M.; while a

light wind coaxed the balloon westward, and even a little toward the

south.

Dr. Ferguson hastened to avail himself of such good fortune, and

rapidly ascending resumed his aërial journey amid a long wake of golden

morning sunshine.