distance of
some twenty miles straight ahead, appeared the Stack Mountains. Towns,
villages, farm buildings, and solitary cabins were dotted about all over
the country, and beyond all, from S.S.E. round by S. and W. to N., could
be seen the blue sea, dotted here and there with the brown sails of the
fishing craft or the scarcely whiter canvas of the coasters.

Satisfied that all was right, the professor returned to the pilot-house,
and, closing the doors to exclude the intense cold of the higher
atmospheric region, perfected the vacuum in the air chambers, causing
the ship to immediately soar aloft to the enormous height of thirty-five
thousand feet; having done which he made his way below again and plunged
into his bath.

On meeting his companions at the breakfast-table, von Schalckenberg
informed them of the position and elevation of the ship, and they at
once expressed an ardent desire to go out on deck immediately after
breakfast to view the magnificent prospect spread out around and beneath
them.

"You will have to put on your diving suits then, gentlemen," remarked
the scientist, "for you would find it quite impossible to breathe in the
extremely rarefied atmosphere which now supports us; moreover, it is so
intensely cold that, unless exceedingly well protected, you would soon
freeze to death. But I quite agree with you that the prospect,
embracing as it does a circle of--let me see," and he made a hasty
calculation on the back of an envelope--"yes, a circle of very nearly
four hundred and sixty miles in diameter, must be well worth looking
at."

Accordingly, on the completion of the meal, the quartette descended to
the diving-room, and there donned their armour, taking the additional
precaution of adding a flannel overall to their ordinary inner diving
dress. Thus equipped, they made their way to the pilot-house, carefully
closing all doors behind them on the way, and sallied out on deck.

The spectacle which then met their gaze was novel beyond all power of
description, and can only be feebly suggested. The sky overhead was of
an intense ultramarine hue, approaching in depth to indigo, gradually
changing, as the eye travelled downward from the zenith toward the
horizon, to a pallid colourless hue. The stars--excepting those near
the horizon--were almost as distinctly visible as at midnight; whilst
the sun, shorn of his rays, hung in the sky like a great ball of molten
copper; the moon also, reduced t