I was
there. Perhaps your highness would like me to explain it, as it will
not occupy your attention more than an hour."

"No, no, skip that, Huckaback, and go on."

------------------------------------------------------------------------

But as soon as I had gratified my curiosity, I began to be alarmed at my
situation, not so much on account of the means of supporting existence,
for there was more than sufficient.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

"More than sufficient! Why what could you have to eat?"

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Plenty of fresh fish, your highness, which had been taken up in the
column of water at the same time I was, and the fresh water already lay
in little pools around me. But the cold was dreadful, and I felt that I
could not support it many hours longer, and how to get down again was a
problem which I could not solve.

It was however soon solved for me, for the cloud having completed its
chemical labours, descended as rapidly as it had risen, and joined many
others, that were engaged in sharp conflict. As I beheld them darting
against each other, and discharging the electric fluid in the violence
of their collision, I was filled with trepidation and dismay, lest,
meeting an adversary, I should be hurled into the abyss below, or be
withered by the artillery of heaven. But I was fortunate enough to
escape. The cloud which bore me descended to within a hundred yards of
the earth, and then was hurried along by the wind with such velocity and
noise, that I perceived we were assisting at a hurricane.

As we neared the earth, the cloud, unable to resist the force of its
attraction, was compelled to deliver up its burthen, and down I fell,
with such torrents of water, that it reminded me of the deluge. The
tornado was now in all its strength. The wind roared and shrieked in
its wild fury, and such was its force that I fell in an acute angle.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

"What did you fall in?" interrupted the pacha. "I don't know what that
is."

"I fell in a slanting direction, your highness, describing the
hypotenuse between the base and perpendicular, created by the force of
the wind, and the attraction of gravitation."

"Holy Prophet! who can understand such stuff? Speak plain; do you laugh
at our beards?"

"Min Allah! God forbid! Your ser