laying out his course and marking it on his maps, taking his
observations whenever he could, recording the readings of his
barometers, thermometers, and chronometers, and making full entries
in his log-book.

The colleagues wrapped themselves well up and eagerly watched for the
sight of land to the southward. At Uncle Prudent's request Frycollin
tried to pump the cook as to whither the engineer was bound, but what
reliance could be placed on the information given by this Gascon?
Sometimes Robur was an ex-minister of the Argentine Republic,
sometimes a lord of the Admiralty, sometimes an ex-President of the
United States, sometimes a Spanish general temporarily retired,
sometimes a Viceroy of the Indies who had sought a more elevated
position in the air. Sometimes he possessed millions, thanks to
successful razzias in the aeronef, and he had been proclaimed for
piracy. Sometimes he had been ruined by making the aeronef, and had
been forced to fly aloft to escape from his creditors. As to knowing
if he were going to stop anywhere, no! But if he thought of going to
the moon, and found there a convenient anchorage, he would anchor
there! "Eh! Fry! My boy! That would just suit you to see what was
going on up there."

"I shall not go! I refuse!" said the Negro, who took all these things
seriously.

"And why, Fry, why? You might get married to some pretty bouncing
Lunarian!"

Frycollin reported this conversation to his master, who saw it was
evident that nothing was to be learnt about Robur. And so he thought
still more of how he could have his revenge on him.

"Phil," said he one day, "is it quite certain that escape is
impossible?"

"Impossible."

"Be it so! But a man is always his own property; and if necessary, by
sacrificing his life--"

"If we are to make that sacrifice," said Phil Evans, "the sooner the
better. It is almost time to end this. Where is the "Albatross"
going? Here we are flying obliquely over the Atlantic, and if we keep
on we shall get to the coast of Patagonia or Tierra del Fuego. And
what are we to do then? Get into the Pacific, or go to the continent
at the South Pole? Everything is possible with this Robur. We shall
be lost in the end. It is thus a case of legitimate self-defence, and
if we must perish--"

"Which we shall not do," answered Uncle Prudent, "without being
avenged, without annihilating this machine and all she carries."

The colleagues had reached a stage of impotent fury,