Through the Air to the North Pole | Page 9

cheers of delight. It was almost filled with
machinery, and occupied a little more than half of the whole boat,
being twenty-two by ten feet in size.
The two boys did not know the use of one quarter of the machinery and
apparatus they gazed on. There were electric motors, storage batteries,
two gasoline engines similar to those used in automobiles, pumps, large
and small tanks, instruments for measuring the electric current, for
telling the temperature, the amount of moisture in the air, the speed of
the wind, the speed of the ship, the height to which it went, besides
compasses, barometers, telescopes, and other instruments.
There were levers and wheels on every side, switches, valves, electric
plugs and handles. Lockers arranged close to the wall and along the
floor held supplies and materials. Everything was new and shining, and
the professor smiled with pride as he touched piece after piece of
machinery, and looked at the different instruments.
"Now we'll go out on the stern," he said.
The boys followed as he ascended the companion steps and emerged on
a small platform at the rear end of the cabin.
"Do you know what this is?" asked the professor, touching a long, thin,
round object.
"Looks like a gun," replied Mark.
"That's just what it is. It's a machine gun that will fire one hundred
shots a minute, and it can be turned in any direction, as it works on a
swivel. I don't know that we'll have any use for it, but I thought I'd take
it along."
Then the professor pointed out where the propeller shaft ran from the
engine room out through the stern, and showed how the rudder was
worked by wire ropes extending from it to the conning tower.

"In short we have everything necessary to successfully navigate the
air," he went on. "Not a thing has been overlooked. All I have to do is
to fill the big bag of oiled silk with a new gas I have discovered and up
we go. This is really the most important part of the invention. Without
this powerful gas the airship would not rise above the earth.
"But I have found this gas, which can be made in unlimited quantities
from simple materials that we can carry with us. The gas has enormous
lifting power, and if it was not for that I would not dare make such a
large and comfortable airship. As it is, we can sail through the air as
easily as if we were on an ocean liner on the sea and much more
quickly.
"I generate the gas in the engine room as I need it," the professor went
on. "It goes to the oiled silk bag through two tubes. When we have
arisen to a sufficient height I start the electric engine, the propeller
whirls around, and the ship moves forward, just as a steamboat does
when the screw is set in motion. Then all I have to do is to steer."
"It's great!" cried Jack with sparkling eyes.
"It certainly is," agreed Mark.
From the stern the professor took the boys to the conning tower, where
there were several wheels and levers, that placed most of the important
machines and engines in the boat under the direct control of the
steersman. A lever turned one way would send the ship ahead. Turned
in the opposite direction it would reverse the course. A wheel like that
on an automobile served to direct the rudder and so guided the
Monarch's course. Other levers controlled the speed of the engines, and
the supply of gas that filled the silk bag.
"Here is where we shall carry our supplies of condensed food," the
professor went on, leading the way back into the middle room. "We
will take along capsules that will supply us in a small space with meat,
vegetables, soups, tea and coffee, besides milk.
"The water we will get as we speed along, dropping down to earth

whenever it is necessary. As for clothing, I have an abundant supply."
He opened a locker and disclosed a pile of fur garments. There were
big coats, caps and boots, everything made with a furry surface within
as well as without.
"Any one would think you were going into some cold country,
professor," said Jack, looking at the warm garments.
"So we are! We are going to find the north pole!" exclaimed the old
inventor.
"The north pole?" cried Mark.
"That's what I said. Do you boys want to go along in the Monarch to a
place where never mortal man has been?"
At that instant there came a loud knock at the door.
CHAPTER V
A PLAN TO SEEK THE NORTH POLE
"Hark! What was that?" exclaimed Professor Henderson in a hoarse
whisper.
"Sounded like