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Ben Zoof made the sleeping accommodation as comfortable as the circumstances would allow; the horses were clogged and turned out to feed upon the rich pasture that clothed the shore, and the night passed without special incident.
Nothing could be seen of Orleansville, which ought to have been about six miles to the southwest; and Ben Zoof, who had mounted the highest point of view attainable, could distinguish sea, and nothing but sea, to the farthest horizon. Quitting their encampment and riding on, the bewildered explorers kept close to the new shore.
The Jew hesitated. "Come now, what is the use of your hesitating? Your gold will have no value when you go back to the world." "What do you mean?" asked Hakkabut, startled. "You will find out some day," answered Ben Zoof, significantly. Hakkabut drew out a small piece of gold from his pocket, took it close under the lamp, rolled it over in his hand, and pressed it to his lips.
"Your complexion isn't the fairest in the world, but you are not black yet." "Well, I had much sooner be a white Friday than a black one," rejoined Ben Zoof. Still no ship appeared; and Captain Servadac, after the example of all previous Crusoes, began to consider it advisable to investigate the resources of his domain. The new territory of which he had become the monarch he named Gourbi Island.
"No, stop a moment," he said, as Ben Zoof was moving away on his, errand; "perhaps I had better go with you myself; the old Jew may make a difficulty about lending us any of his property." "Why should we not all go?" asked the count; "we should see what kind of a life the misanthrope leads on board the Hansa." The proposal met with general approbation.
"No doubt," said Ben Zoof, "this time we shall stick together." Another thought occurred. Was it not only too likely that, in the fusion of the two atmospheres, the balloon itself, in which they were being conveyed, would be rent into ribbons, and every one of its passengers hurled into destruction, so that not a Gallian should survive to tell the tale of their strange peregrinations?
"No, no, your Excellency," burst in Ben Zoof, emphatically; "the fellows are chicken-hearted enough already; only tell them what has happened, and in sheer despondency they will not do another stroke of work." "Besides," said Lieutenant Procope, who took very much the same view as the orderly, "they are so miserably ignorant they would be sure to misunderstand you."
Ben Zoof burst into a roar of laughter. "Bravo!" he said, "we should make a good pair of clowns." But the captain was inclined to take a more serious view of the matter. For a few seconds he stood lost in thought, then said solemnly, "Ben Zoof, I must be dreaming. Pinch me hard; I must be either asleep or mad." "It is very certain that something has happened to us," said Ben Zoof.
"What is it, Ben Zoof?" asked the captain. "It looks to me like a man on a rock, waving his arms in the air," said the orderly. "Plague on it!" muttered Servadac; "I hope we are not too late." Again they went on; but soon Ben Zoof stopped for the third time. "It is a semaphore, sir; I see it quite distinctly." And he was not mistaken; it had been a telegraph in motion that had caught his eye.
Ben Zoof admitted the necessity of extemporizing a kind of parasol for himself, otherwise he must literally have been roasted to death upon the exposed summit of the cliff. Meanwhile, Servadac was doing his utmost it must be acknowledged, with indifferent success to recall the lessons of his school-days.
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