"If it was to break! If it was to break!" said the unfortunate Negro.

Hence continual faintings.

Only think! A fall of over four thousand feet, which would smash him to a jelly! An hour afterwards Uncle Prudent and Phil Evans appeared on the deck.
Robur was no longer there.

At the stem the man at the wheel in his glass cage, his eyes fixed on the compass, followed imperturbably without hesitation the route given by the engineer.
As for the rest of the crew, breakfast probably kept them from their posts.

An assistant engineer, examining the machinery, went from one house to the other.
If the speed of the ship was great the two colleagues could only estimate it imperfectly, for the "Albatross" had passed through the cloud zone which the sun showed some four thousand feet below.
"I can hardly believe it," said Phil Evans.
"Don't believe it!" said Uncle Prudent.