and spread it out on the table.

"Just follow me for a moment," he said, "across the American continent.
Let us make a stride across the narrow strip of Chili,
and over the Cordilleras of the Andes, and get into the heart of
the Pampas. Shall we find any lack of rivers and streams and currents?
No, for here are the Rio Negro and Rio Colorado, and their tributaries
intersected by the 37th parallel, and any of them might have carried
the bottle on its waters. Then, perhaps, in the midst of a tribe
in some Indian settlement on the shores of these almost unknown rivers,
those whom I may call my friends await some providential intervention.
Ought we to disappoint their hopes? Do you not all agree with me
that it is our duty to go along the line my finger is pointing out at
this moment on the map, and if after all we find I have been mistaken,
still to keep straight on and follow the 37th parallel till we find
those we seek, if even we go right round the world?"

His generous enthusiasm so touched his auditors that, involuntarily,
they rose to their feet and grasped his hands, while Robert exclaimed
as he devoured the map with his eyes:

"Yes, my father is there!"

"And where he is," replied Glenarvan, "we'll manage to go, my boy,
and find him. Nothing can be more logical than Paganel's theory,
and we must follow the course he points out without the least hesitation.
Captain Grant may have fallen into the hands of a numerous tribe,
or his captors may be but a handful. In the latter case we shall
carry him off at once, but in the event of the former, after we
have reconnoitered the situation, we must go back to the DUNCAN