responding to seventy days as
accomplished by the new little world.

Many a time during his absence Hector Servadac had wondered how his
present vicissitudes would end, and he had felt some misgivings as
to whether he should ever again set foot upon the island, and see
his faithful orderly, so that it was not without emotion that he had
approached the coast of the sole remaining fragment of Algerian soil.
But his apprehensions were groundless; Gourbi Island was just as he had
left it, with nothing unusual in its aspect, except that a very peculiar
cloud was hovering over it, at an altitude of little more than a hundred
feet. As the yacht approached the shore, this cloud appeared to rise and
fall as if acted upon by some invisible agency, and the captain, after
watching it carefully, perceived that it was not an accumulation of
vapors at all, but a dense mass of birds packed as closely together as
a swarm of herrings, and uttering deafening and discordant cries,
amidst which from time to time the noise of the report of a gun could be
plainly distinguished.

The _Dobryna_ signalized her arrival by firing her cannon, and dropped
anchor in the little port of the Shelif. Almost within a minute Ben Zoof
was seen running, gun in hand, towards the shore; he cleared the last
ridge of rocks at a single bound, and then suddenly halted. For a
few seconds he stood motionless, his eyes fixed, as if obeying the
instructions of a drill sergeant, on a point some fifteen yards distant,
his whole attitude indicating submission and respect; but the sight
of the captain, who was landing, was too much for his equanimity, and
darting forward, he seized his master's hand and covered it with kisses.
Instead, however, of uttering any expressions of welcome or rejoicing
at the captain's return, Ben Zoof broke out into the most vehement
ejaculations.

"Thieves, captain! beastly thieves! Bedouins! pirates! devils!"

"Why, Ben Zoof, what's the matter?" said Servadac soothingly.

"They are thieves! downright, desperate thieves! those infernal birds!
That's what's the matter. It is a good thing you have come. Here have
I for a whole month been spending my powder and shot upon them, and the
more I kill them, the worse they get; and yet, if I were to leave them
alone, we should not have a grain of corn upon the island."

It was soon evident that the orderly had only too much cause for alarm.
The crops had ripened rapidly during the excessive heat