When they reached this port the news was telegraphed to the proper authorities, and, indeed, all over the country, and of course it created a great excitement.
The officers of the Society which had been the means of sending off these three men on their hazardous journey, went immediately to work, and in a few days the steamer, supplied with diving machinery and grappling irons, set out to return to the scene of the disaster.
There everybody worked rapidly and manfully. Diving bells were lowered and everything that could be done was done, but although they labored day and night, for several days no trace of the great projectile could be found on the bottom of the ocean, after searching carefully for a mile or two on every side of the buoy that had been left when they returned to San Francisco.
At last they became convinced that further search was useless, and much to the disappointment of everybody, and the intense grief of the friends of the unfortunate men who had come out on the vessel when it started on its errand of rescue, the Captain ordered the steamer to return to San Francisco.
When they had been sailing homeward for an hour or so, a sailor discovered, about a mile from the vessel, what seemed to be a large buoy, floating on the surface of the sea.
In an instant every glass in the vessel was directed towards this object. It was like a buoy, but it had a flag floating from the top of it!
The steamer immediately headed for it, and when they came near enough everybody saw what it was.
It was the great projectile quietly floating on the waves!
The air which it contained had made it so buoyant that although it probably sank to the bottom of the ocean in its rapid descent, it had risen again, and was now riding on the surface of the ocean like a corked bottle.
But were the men alive? This must be settled instantly.