After pondering the matter a short time, I called into requisition my experience with the bark of the tree.
I repaired to the mountainous seacoast and constructed a more roomy and accurate wind toboggan, and, waiting until a strong wind prevailed in the right direction, I set sail.
As I was inexperienced in the handling of such a vehicle, and as the wind was blowing a gale in my teeth, I soon found myself so high above the earth it was with difficulty I could discern enough of the lay of the land and water by which to guide myself. In fact, I had gone with such rapidity that I was sailing above the Desert of Sahara before I had calculated to have sighted it.
It may possibly be that I was several days in making the trip and that the excitement of it caused the time to speed so rapidly as to mislead me; for, being so high above the earth, I was in perpetual sunlight, as I am sure the sun did not set while making the passage.
It occurs to me now that the fact probably was that as I started from the Pacific Coast and traveled westward my speed simply equaled that of the earth in its eastward movement.
When I concluded to descend I was compelled to take a circular course in order not to come down too rapidly.
I had scanned the desert for the palm trees, mentioned by my father, by the aid of my telescope, which I had brought with me, the field glass being thought by me too small for the purpose.
I soon discerned three monstrous trees which seemed to have but one top to them all. Finding no other object of the same or a similar nature on the surface of this ocean of sand, I rightly conjectured that I had descried the proper point and so maneuvered my vessel as to reach it easily, when I observed a horde of warriors of the desert gesticulating wildly below me. I saw all this with my telescope, as I was still too far above the surface of the earth to have made the discovery with the naked eye.
I was not in the least daunted by this discovery, and continued my descent.
The swiftness of the animals carrying those nomads was marvelous, for, though I traveled with greater speed than that of the wind, they seemed to be always beneath my car and were increasing in numbers.