e.

But refuge, where would they seek it in this low desert, without a
tree, without a bush? The bowels of the earth even would not give it.
Two feet below the surface they would find water.

However, toward the north a series of low hills seemed to limit the
marshy plain. It was as the border of this depression of land. A few
trees were profiled there on a more distant, clearer belt, left by the
clouds on the line of the horizon.

There, if shelter were still lacking, the little band would at least
no longer risk being caught in a possible inundation. There perhaps
was salvation for all.

"Forward, my friends, forward!" repeated Dick Sand. "Three miles more
and we shall be safer than in these bottom-lands."

"Hurry! hurry!" cried Hercules.

The brave black would have wished to take that whole world in big arms
and carry it alone.

Those words inspired those courageous men, and in spite of the fatigue
of a day's march, they advanced more quickly than they had done at the
commencement from the halting-place.

When the storm burst forth the end to be attained was still more than
two miles off. Now--a fact which was the more to be feared--the rain
did not accompany the first lightnings exchanged between the ground
and the electrical clouds. Darkness then became almost complete,
though the sun had not disappeared below the horizon. But the dome of
vapors gradually lowered, as if it threatened to fall in--a falling in
which must result in a torrent of rain. Lightnings, red or blue, split
it in a thousand places, and enveloped the plain in an inextricable
network of fire.

Twenty times Dick and his companions ran the risk of being struck by
lightning. On this plateau, deprived of trees, they formed the only
projecting points which could attract the electrical discharges. Jack,
awakened by the noise of the thunder, hid himself in Hercules' arms.
He was very much afraid, poor little boy, but he did not wish to let
his mother see it, for fear of afflicting her more. Hercules, while
taking great steps, consoled him as well as he could.

"Do not be afraid, little Jack," he repeated. "If the thunder comes
near us, I will break it in two with a single hand. I am stronger than
it!"

And, truly, the giant's strength reassured Jack a little.

Meanwhile the rain must soon fall, and then it would in torrents,
poured out by those clouds in condensing. What would become of Mrs.
Weldon and her companions, if they did not fin