It was a curious spectacle—that mass of clouds piled up, at the moment, away below them! The vapors rolled over each other, and mingled together in confused masses of superb brilliance, as they reflected the rays of the sun. The _Victoria_ had attained an altitude of four thousand feet, and the thermometer indicated a certain diminution of temperature. The land below could no longer be seen. Fifty miles away to the westward, Mount Rubeho raised its sparkling crest, marking the limit of the Ugogo country in east longitude thirty-six degrees twenty minutes. The wind was blowing at the rate of twenty miles an hour, but the aëronauts felt nothing of this increased speed. They observed no jar, and had scarcely any sense of motion at all. Three hours later, the doctor’s prediction was fully verified. Kennedy no longer felt a single shiver of the fever, but partook of some breakfast with an excellent appetite. “That beats sulphate of quinine!” said the energetic Scot, with hearty emphasis and much satisfaction. “Positively,” said Joe, “this is where I’ll have to retire to when I get old!” About ten o’clock in the morning the atmosphere cleared up, the clouds parted, and the country beneath could again be seen, the _Victoria_ meanwhile rapidly descending. Dr. Ferguson was in search of a current that would carry him more to the northeast, and he found it about six hundred feet from the ground. The country was becoming more broken, and even mountainous. The Zungomoro district was fading out of sight in the east with the last cocoa-nut-trees of that latitude. Ere long, the crests of a mountain-range assumed a more decided prominence. A few peaks rose here and there, and it became necessary to keep a sharp lookout for the pointed cones that seemed to spring up every moment. “We’re right among the breakers!” said Kennedy. “Keep cool, Dick. We shan’t touch them,” was the doctor’s quiet answer. “It’s a jolly way to travel, anyhow!” said Joe, with his usual flow of spirits. In fact, the doctor managed his balloon with wondrous dexterity. “Now, if we had been compelled to go afoot over that drenched soil,” said he, “we should still be dragging along in a pestilential mire. Since our departure from Zanzibar, half our beasts of burden would have died with fatigue. We should be looking like ghosts ourselves, and despair would be seizing on our hearts. We should be in continual squabbles with our guides and porters, and completely exposed to their unbridled brutality. During the daytime, a damp, penetrating, unendurable humidity! At night, a cold frequently intolerable, and the stings of a kind of fly whose bite pierces the thickest cloth, and drives the victim crazy! All this, too, without saying any thing about wild beasts and ferocious native tribes!” “I move that we don’t try it!” said Joe, in his droll way.