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in an hour's journey, in a fertile dip of the soil, vegetation
had resumed all its vigor at some distance from Mdaburu.
The wind fell with the close of the day, and the atmosphere
seemed to sleep. The doctor vainly sought for a
current of air at different heights, and, at last, seeing this
calm of all nature, he resolved to pass the night afloat, and,
for greater safety, rose to the height of one thousand feet,
where the balloon remained motionless. The night was
magnificent, the heavens glittering with stars, and profoundly
silent in the upper air.

Dick and Joe stretched themselves on their peaceful
couch, and were soon sound asleep, the doctor keeping the
first watch. At twelve o'clock the latter was relieved by
Kennedy.

"Should the slightest accident happen, waken me,"
said Ferguson, "and, above all things, don't lose sight of
the barometer. To us it is the compass!"

The night was cold. There were twenty-seven degrees
of difference between its temperature and that of the daytime.
With nightfall had begun the nocturnal concert
of animals driven from their hiding-places by hunger and
thirst. The frogs struck in their guttural soprano,
redoubled by the yelping of the jackals, while the imposing
bass of the African lion sustained the accords of this living
orchestra.

Upon resuming his post, in the morning, the doctor
consulted his compass, and found that the wind had
changed during the night. The balloon had been bearing
about thirty miles to the northwest during the last two
hours. It was then passing over Mabunguru, a stony
country, strewn with blocks of syenite of a fine polish, and
knobbed with huge bowlders and angular ridges of rock;
conic masses, like the rocks of Karnak, studded the soil
like so many Druidic dolmens; the bones of buffaloes and
elephants whitened it here and there; but few trees could
be seen, excepting in the east, where there were dense
woods, among which a few villages lay half concealed.

Toward seven o'clock they saw a huge round rock
nearly two miles in extent, like an immense tortoise.

"We are on the right track," said Dr. Ferguson.
"There's Jihoue-la-Mkoa, where we must halt for a few
minutes. I am going to renew the supply of water necessary
for my cylinder, and so let us try to anchor somewhere.

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