Five Weeks in a Balloon
cutting it open at the lower end. He then was very careful to expel the
last remnant of hydrogen through the valve, after which he heaped up a
quantity of grass under the balloon, and set fire to it.
It takes but a little while to inflate a balloon with hot air. A head
of one hundred and eighty degrees is sufficient to diminish the weight
of the air it contains to the extent of one-half, by rarefying it.
Thus, the _Victoria_ quickly began to assume a more rounded form. There
was no lack of grass; the fire was kept in full blast by the doctor’s
assiduous efforts, and the balloon grew fuller every instant.
It was then a quarter to four o’clock.
At this moment the band of Talabas reappeared about two miles to the
northward, and the three friends could hear their cries, and the
clatter of their horses galloping at full speed.
“In twenty minutes they will be here!” said Kennedy.
“More grass! more grass, Joe! In ten minutes we shall have her full of
hot air.”
“Here it is, doctor!”
The _Victoria_ was now two-thirds inflated.
“Come, my friends, let us take hold of the network, as we did before.”
“All right!” they answered together.
In about ten minutes a few jerking motions by the balloon indicated
that it was disposed to start again. The Talabas were approaching. They
were hardly five hundred paces away.
“Hold on fast!” cried Ferguson.
“Have no fear, master—have no fear!”
And the doctor, with his foot pushed another heap of grass upon the
fire.
With this the balloon, now completely inflated by the increased
temperature, moved away, sweeping the branches of the baobab in her
flight.
“We’re off!” shouted Joe.
A volley of musketry responded to his exclamation. A bullet even
ploughed his shoulder; but Kennedy, leaning over, and discharging his
rifle with one hand, brought another of the enemy to the ground.
Cries of fury exceeding all description hailed the departure of the
balloon, which had at once ascended nearly eight hundred feet. A swift
current caught and swept it along with the most alarming oscillations,
while the intrepid doctor and his friends saw the gulf of the cataracts
yawning below them.
Ten minutes later, and without having exchanged a word, they descended
gradually toward the other bank of the river.
There, astonished, speechless, terrified, stood a group of men clad in
the French uniform. Judge of their amazement when they saw the balloon
rise from the right bank of the river. They had well-nigh taken it for
some celestial phenomenon, but their officers, a lieutenant of marines
and a naval ensign, having seen mention made of Dr. Ferguson’s daring
expedition, in the European papers, quickly explained the real state of
the case.
The balloon, losing its inflation little by little, settled with the
daring travellers still clinging to its network; but it was doubtful
whether it would reach the land. At once some of the brave Frenchmen
rushed into the water and caught the three aëronauts in their arms just
as the _Victoria_ fell at the distance of a few fathoms from the left
bank of the Senegal.
“Dr. Ferguson!” exclaimed the lieutenant.
“The same, sir,” replied the doctor, quietly, “and his two friends.”
The Frenchmen escorted our travellers from the river, while the
balloon, half-empty, and borne away by a swift current, sped on, to
plunge, like a huge bubble, headlong with the waters of the Senegal,
into the cataracts of Gouina.
“The poor _Victoria!_” was Joe’s farewell remark.
The doctor could not restrain a tear, and extending his hands his two
friends wrung them silently with that deep emotion which requires no
spoken words.
CHAPTER FORTY-FOURTH.
Conclusion.—The Certificate.—The French Settlements.—The Post of
Medina.—The Basilic.—Saint Louis.—The English Frigate.—The Return to
London.
The expedition upon the bank of the river had been sent by the governor
of Senegal. It consisted of two officers, Messrs. Dufraisse, lieutenant
of marines, and Rodamel, naval ensign, and with these were a sergeant
and seven soldiers. For two days they had been engaged in reconnoitring
the most favorable situation for a post at Gouina, when they became
witnesses of Dr. Ferguson’s arrival.
The warm greetings and felicitations of which our travellers were the
recipients may be imagined. The Frenchmen, and they alone, having had
ocular proof of the accomplishment of the daring project, naturally
became Dr. Ferguson’s witnesses. Hence the doctor at once asked them to
give their official testimony of his arrival at the cataracts of
Gouina.
“You would have no objection to signing a certificate of the fact,
would you?” he inquired of Lieutenant Dufraisse.
“At your orders!” the latter instantly replied.
The Englishmen were escorted to a provisional post established on the
bank of the river, where they found the most assiduous attention, and
every thing to supply their wants. And there the following certificate
was drawn up in the terms in which it appears to-day, in the archives
of the Royal Geographical Society of London:
“We, the undersigned, do hereby declare that, on the day herein
mentioned, we witnessed the arrival of Dr. Ferguson and his two
companions, Richard Kennedy and Joseph Wilson, clinging to the cordage
and network of a balloon, and that the said balloon fell at a distance
of a few paces from us into the river, and being swept away by the
current was lost in the cataracts of Gouina. In testimony whereof, we
have hereunto set our hands and seals beside those of the persons
hereinabove named, for the information of all whom it may concern.
“Done at the Cataracts of Gouina, on the 24th of May, 1862.
“(Signed),
“SAMUEL FERGUSON
“RICHARD KENNEDY,
“JOSEPH WILSON,
“DUFRAISSE, _Lieutenant of Marines_,
“RODAMEL, _Naval Ensign_,
“DUFAYS, _Sergeant_,
“FLIPPEAU, MAYOR, PELISSIER, LOROIS, RASCAGNET, GUILLON, LEBEL,
_Privates_.”
Here ended the astonishing journey of Dr. Ferguson and his brave
companions, as vouched for by undeniable testimony; and they found
themselves among friends in the midst of most hospitable tribes, whose
relations with the French settlements are frequent and amicable.
They had arrived at Senegal on Saturday, the 24th of May, and on the
27th of the same month they reached the post of Medina, situated a
little farther to the north, but on the river.
There the French officers received them with open arms, and lavished
upon them all the resources of their hospitality. Thus aided, the
doctor and his friends were enabled to embark almost immediately on the
small steamer called the _Basilic_, which ran down to the mouth of the
river.
Two weeks later, on the 10th of June, they arrived at Saint Louis,
where the governor gave them a magnificent reception, and they
recovered completely from their excitement and fatigue.
Besides, Joe said to every one who chose to listen:
“That was a stupid trip of ours, after all, and I wouldn’t advise any
body who is greedy for excitement to undertake it. It gets very
tiresome at the last, and if it hadn’t been for the adventures on Lake
Tchad and at the Senegal River, I do believe that we’d have died of
yawning.”
An English frigate was just about to sail, and the three travellers
procured passage on board of her. On the 25th of June they arrived at
Portsmouth, and on the next day at London.
We will not describe the reception they got from the Royal Geographical
Society, nor the intense curiosity and consideration of which they
became the objects. Kennedy set off, at once, for Edinburgh, with his
famous rifle, for he was in haste to relieve the anxiety of his
faithful old housekeeper.
The doctor and his devoted Joe remained the same men that we have known
them, excepting that one change took place at their own suggestion.
They ceased to be master and servant, in order to become bosom friends.
The journals of all Europe were untiring in their praises of the bold
explorers, and the _Daily Telegraph_ struck off an edition of three
hundred and seventy-seven thousand copies on the day when it published
a sketch of the trip.
Doctor Ferguson, at a public meeting of the Royal Geographical Society,
gave a recital of his journey through the air, and obtained for himself
and his companions the golden medal set apart to reward the most
remarkable exploring expedition of the year 1862.
The first result of Dr. Ferguson’s expedition was to establish, in the
most precise manner, the facts and geographical surveys reported by
Messrs. Barth, Burton, Speke, and others. Thanks to the still more
recent expeditions of Messrs. Speke and Grant, De Heuglin and
Muntzinger, who have been ascending to the sources of the Nile, and
penetrating to the centre of Africa, we shall be enabled ere long to
verify, in turn, the discoveries of Dr. Ferguson in that vast region
comprised between the fourteenth and thirty-third degrees of east
longitude.