Tom Turner was an Englishman of about forty-five, broad in the
shoulders and short in the legs, a man of iron, with one of those
enormous characteristic heads that Hogarth rejoiced in.

Shall we see Mr. Robur to-day?" asked Phil Evans.

"I don't know," said Turner.

"I need not ask if he has gone out."

"Perhaps he has."

"And when will he come back?"

"When he has finished his cruise."

And Tom went into his cabin.

With this reply they had to be contented. Matters did not look
promising, particularly as on reference to the compass it appeared
that the "Albatross" was still steering southwest.

Great was the contrast between the barren tract of the Bad Lands
passed over during the night and the landscape then unrolling beneath
them.

The aeronef was now more than six hundred miles from Omaha, and over
a country which Phil Evans could not recognize because he had never
been there before. A few forts to keep the Indians in order crowned