, only two craft--both of them steamers--
being sighted during the day. They were steering north, and were
hull-down, so that they probably failed to notice the presence of the
_Flying Fish_. The Maxim gun, being no longer needed, was dismounted
again and stowed away, in accordance with a recognised rule that the
ship was always to be kept in condition for either mounting into the
air, or descending beneath the surface of the sea, at a moment's notice.

Nightfall found the voyagers about sixty miles distant from the southern
shore of the Black Sea, at which point they took to the air, rising to a
height of ten thousand feet, and, with a light air of wind from the
southward against them, increasing their speed to thirty-five knots.

Asia Minor is distinctly a hilly country, but there are no very lofty
elevations under the meridian of the thirtieth degree of east
longitude--along which the _Flying Fish_ was then running--nor, indeed,
in its immediate vicinity, until the southern coast is approached,
where, at a distance of about forty miles from the point at which the
travellers would again pass out over the water, and some twenty-five
miles to the left of their proper course, the Bei Dagh peak rises to a
height of ten thousand four hundred feet, while, a few miles farther on,
and quite near to their track, the highest peak of the Susuz Dagh range
rises still higher by one hundred and fifty feet. The _Flying Fish_,
therefore, skimming along at a height of ten thousand feet only, was
liable to dash into either of these peaks if it so happened that she
chanced to encounter an air current to deflect her to the eastward of
her proper course. This, however, was exceedingly unlikely, for at the
height of ten thousand feet above the earth she was in what is known as
"the calm belt" of the atmosphere, where the air-currents--when such
exist at all--are very sluggish. The danger of collision with either of
the peaks above-mentioned was therefore so remote as to be hardly worth
consideration, and in any case it could not arise until the early hours
of the following morning. It was therefore decided that there was no
need for the maintenance of an all-night watch in the pilot-house,
Mildmay undertaking to be up in good time to obviate any possibility of
danger.

The first flash of sunrise next morning found the _Flying Fish_ just
passing over the border between land and sea on the southern coast of
Asia Minor, with the Caste