flying-machine maintained that gentle curve until it swung around
well to the rear of the cloud, where again Professor Featherwit
broke out in ecstatic praises of their marvellous good fortune.

" 'Tis worth a life's ransom, for never until now hath mortal
being been blessed with such a magnificent opportunity for taking
notes and drawing deductions which--"

The professor nimbly ducked his head to dodge a ragged splinter
of freshly torn wood which came whistling past, cast far away
from the tornado proper by those erratic winds. And at the same
instant the machine itself recoiled, shivering and creaking in
all its cunning joints under a gust of wind which seemed composed
of both ice and fire.

"Oh, I say!" gasped Waldo, when he could rally from the sudden
blow. "Turn the old thing the other way, uncle Phaeton, and
let's go look for--well, almost anything's better than this old
cyclone!"

"Tornado, lad," swiftly corrected the man of precision, leaning
far forward, and gazing enthralled upon the vision which fairly
thrilled his heart to its very centre. "Never again may we have
such another opportunity for making--"

They were now directly in the rear of the storm, and as the
air-ship headed across that track of destruction, it gave a
drunken stagger, casting down its inmates, from whose parching
lips burst cries of varying import.