It was indeed the "Albatross!" It was indeed Robur who had reappeared in the heights of the sky! It was he who like a huge bird of prey¹ was going to strike the "Go-Ahead."  
And yet, nine months before, the aeronef, shattered by the explosion, her screws broken, her deck smashed in two, had been apparently³ annihilated⁴.
 
Without the prodigious⁵ coolness of the engineer, who reversed the gyratory motion of the fore² propeller⁶ and converted it into a suspensory screw, the men of the "Albatross" would all have been asphyxiated⁷ by the fall. But if they had escaped asphyxia, how had they escaped being drowned in the Pacific?
 
The remains⁸ of the deck, the blades of the propellers⁹, the compartments¹⁰ of the cabins, all formed a sort of raft. When a wounded bird falls on the waves its wings keep it afloat. For several hours Robur and his men remained unhelped, at first on the wreck¹¹, and afterwards in the india-rubber boat that had fallen uninjured. A few hours after sunrise they were sighted by a passing ship, and a boat was lowered to their rescue.
 
Robur and his companions were saved, and so was much of what remained of the aeronef. The engineer said that his ship had perished in a collision, and no further questions were asked him.
 
The ship was an English three-master, the "Two Friends," bound for Melbourne, where she arrived a few days afterwards.
 
Robur was in Australia, but a long way from X Island, to which he desired to return as soon as possible.
 
In the ruins of the aftermost cabin he had found a considerable sum of money, quite enough to provide for himself and companions without applying to anyone for help. A short time after he arrived in Melbourne he became the owner of a small brigantine of about a hundred tons, and in her he sailed for X Island.
 
There he had but one idea—to be avenged¹². But to secure his vengeance¹³ he would have to make another "Albatross." This after all was an easy task for him who made the first. He used up what he could of the old material; the propellers and engines he had brought back in the brigantine. The mechanism¹⁴ was fitted with new piles and new accumulators, and, in short, in less than eight months, the work was finished, and a new "Albatross," identical with the one destroyed by the explosion, was ready to take flight. And he had the same crew.
 
The "Albatross" left X Island in the first week of April. During this aerial passage Robur did not want to be seen from the earth, and he came along almost always above the clouds. When he arrived over North America he descended¹⁵ in a desolate¹⁶ spot in the Far West. There the engineer, keeping a profound incognito¹⁷, learnt with considerable pleasure that the Weldon Institute was about to begin its experiments, and that the "Go-Ahead," with Uncle Prudent¹⁸ and Phil Evans, was going to start from Philadelphia on the 29th of April.
 
Here was a chance for Robur and his crew to gratify their longing¹⁹ for revenge. Here was a chance for inflicting²⁰ on their foes²¹ a terrible vengeance, which in the "Go-Ahead" they could not escape. A public vengeance, which would at the same time prove the superiority of the aeronef to all aerostats and contrivances of that nature!
 
And that is why, on this very day, like a vulture from the clouds, the aeronef appeared over Fairmount Park.
 
Yes! It was the "Albatross," easily recognizable by all those who had never before seen her.
 
The "Go-Ahead" was in full flight; but it soon appeared that she could not escape horizontally, and so she sought her safety in a vertical²² direction, not dropping to the ground, for the aeronef would have cut her off, but rising to a zone where she could not perhaps be reached. This was very daring, and at the same time very logical.
 
But the "Albatross" began to rise after her. Although she was smaller than the "Go-Ahead," it was a case of the swordfish and the whale.
 
This could easily be seen from below and with what anxiety! In a few moments the aerostat had attained²³ a height of sixteen thousand feet.
 
The "Albatross" followed her as she rose. She flew round her flanks, and maneuvered²⁴ round her in a circle with a constantly diminishing radius²⁵. She could have annihilated her at a stroke, and Uncle Prudent and his companions would have b............