ghly compressed air at
once rushed forth, and in less than half a minute the huge bulk of the
ship was lying poised as lightly as an air-bubble on the surface of the
heaving water. The main vapour-valve was then cautiously opened, and a
partial vacuum produced, when, as easily as a sea-bird, the _Flying
Fish_ rose at once into the air. The engines were next turned ahead,
the helm adjusted, and the northward journey was fairly begun.

The wind was blowing at the rate of about fifteen miles an hour, and
nearly dead fair; the engines were therefore set so as just to turn
round and no more; this gave the ship a speed of about twelve knots
through the air, which, added to the rate of the wind, gave a total
speed of twenty-seven knots over the ground--or rather over, the water--
and at this pace they calculated that, after making the necessary
allowance in their course for the set of the wind, they would reach the
Irish coast, in the vicinity of Cape Clear, at about five o'clock the
next morning. Their reason for not travelling faster was that, as the
baronet said, they were on a pleasure cruise, and having been pent up
inside the hull for fully thirty-six hours, they felt that a few hours
in the open air would be an acceptable change.

They pursued their flight throughout the day at an altitude of only a
thousand feet above the sea, except when they encountered a ship--which
happened only once during the hours of daylight--and when this occurred
they rose, on the instant of sighting her, to the highest attainable
distance, in pursuance of their resolve to attract as little attention
as possible, descending again to their former level as soon as they had
passed beyond her range of vision. At this latter elevation they were
able to enjoy to the full the health-giving properties of the pure sea-
breeze, and to revel in a prospect--though it was only that of the
restless sea--of nearly forty nautical miles on every side; the horizon,
that is to say, forming a circle of little less than eighty miles
diameter round about them. And though it may be hastily thought that,
with a sea bare of craft there was little or nothing to interest the
travellers, this was by no means the case; for at their height the water
was clear and transparent for a long distance below the surface, and the
gambols of the fish, of which there were great numbers visible,
including several schools of porpoises and a solitary whale, could be
seen distinct