Fifteen Hundred Miles an Hour

OUR VOYAGE BEGINS AT LAST.
CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
The narrative contained in the papers which are given to the world in this book, is of so marvellous a character as to have made me long hesitate before venturing on their publication. Even now I do so in the full expectation of scorn and unbelief.
I owe it to the world to state exactly how these papers came into my hands. That done, I must leave it to their own appearance of truth to command belief.
The year before last, I was travelling through Northern Africa on a scientific expedition. It was early in the month of May that I reached the northern confines of the Great Desert, amongst the feathery palm-groves in the delicious oasis of Biskra.
I had started one day, with the first streak of dawn, upon a short expedition into the desert. My two Arab followers were anxious to cover as much distance as possible before the heat of the sun became oppressive.
It was about ten o'clock before we halted for breakfast, and the oasis of Biskra looked but a black spot on the northern horizon. The heavens up to now were an intensely brilliant blue, but a dark cloud far away over the distant desert could be seen rapidly increasing in size.
Gradually the whole vault of sky assumed a coppery aspect, and the sun shone paler and paler each moment. The heat and oppressiveness were almost unbearable; not a breath of air relieved the suffocating atmosphere. The sun finally disappeared behind the curtain of lowering cloud, and a darkness began to creep over the earth. The Arabs prepared for the storm which they knew from experience was brewing. The dreaded sandstorm was approaching. It came on the wings of the southern gale with terrific speed, and suddenly the air became almost as dark as midnight, full of fine blinding sand. We could not see twenty paces ahead; and now the sluggish atmosphere was stirred with the rushing and shrieking of a mighty wind.
As I gazed for one brief moment upwards during a lull in the storm, my eyes were almost blinded by a brilliant light, brighter than the flame from an incandescent lamp, and a thousand times as large, which seemed to shoot from out of space. At the same awful moment the very dome of heaven seemed cracked asunder by a loud report, different from anything I had ever heard before. It was a solid and metallic sound, louder and sharper than the report of tons of exploding nitro-glycerine. The earth shook and trembled to its utmost foundations, and the rocks seemed to recoil at the frightful explosion. The Arabs were struck dumb and motionless with horror, and I, for several moments, was as one stone-blind. With the report a huge body seemed to have struck the rocks a short distance from us, but it was impossible to tell what it was until the fury of the storm was somewhat spent. The worst was now over; and the sand, the thunder, and the darkness vanished almost as suddenly as they came. But we did not venture forth until the welcome, glorious sun shone down again upon the wet rocks; and then the Arabs engaged in fervent prayer to Allah for our miraculous deliverance from a terrible fate.