The boys were smitten as it were with dumbness. No one spoke, though, strangely enough, no fear possessed them--only a great stillness and peace. The balloon had now apparently reached that point at which it could rest in equilibrium, and hung motionless over the peak from which the boys had risen. The cold had grown intense, and the evening was approaching, though the sun's rays still spread colour through the great cloudland below them. At last Frank broke the silence: 'What is this, Snap,' he said, 'floating round the car?' and he drew in his hand covered with minute fragments of ice. 'It looks like powdered ice,' replied Snap. 'I don't much fancy this country to winter in,' broke out Dick; 'I suppose, Snap, you couldn't get this craft of yours to go down a bit, could you?' Even as Wharton spoke the balloon seemed to have heard him, or at any rate the clouds seemed to be drawing nearer, and the storm of ice-morsels grew thicker. 'I guess this ice, or snow, or hoar-frost, or whatever it is, won't make our shay any lighter,' remarked Dick; 'do you see how it rests on the car and seems to thicken round the balloon?' 'Yes,' said Frank, 'and if it rests on the edge of the car what must it do on the broad top of the balloon?' 'Dick,' whispered Snap at this moment, 'what is that?' and he pointed to the side of the great bubble above them, from which a long wreath of thin white smoke was trailing into space. Dick looked. 'I'm blowed if I know,' he replied. 'Then I'll tell you,' Snap hissed in his ear: 'the balloon has sprung a leak, that is the gas escaping; the weight of this stuff' (touching the snow) 'on the top has done it, and we are going down fast enough even to suit you. Out with that sack of ballast,' he added, and Wharton and Frank sent the only sand-bag over the side. This sent the balloon up again a little way, but they were now comparatively near the earth. Round them a regular snow-storm was raging. The particles of ice which they had met with in the higher layer of atmosphere had now gathered into snowflakes. The storm, such as it was, lasted but a few minutes, and then the sinking sun lit up the scene below them. As they looked down, the boys saw a great billowy ocean of thick, rosy fog. Wave upon wave it seemed to roll, opaque, soft, and beautiful in colour, and as they looked it came up and up to meet them. The snow upon the top of the balloon was still too heavy for them, and they were sinking fast. In another minute the car was engulfed in the rosy clouds, which were already turning to a more sombre colour, and later on changed from rose to purple, and then to sullen grey.