will keep our readers up to date on this endeavor, which is unprecedented in the annals of geography.
As you might expect, this article had an enormous impact: at first it stirred up storms of skepticism; folks regarded Dr. Fergusson as an outright fantasy, an invention of Mr. P. T. Barnum—who, after working the states of the Union, was all set to “take in” the British Isles.
In Geneva a witty rebuttal appeared in the February issue of Dispatches from the Geographical Society; it poked fun at London’s Royal Society, the Travelers Club, and the phenomenal sturgeon.
But Herr Petermann’s Mitteilungen,2 published in Gotha, reduced the Geneva journal to the most abject silence. Herr Petermann was personally familiar with Dr. Fergusson and vouched for the bravery of his daring friend.
Soon, however, there was no longer any room for doubt; preparations for the journey were under way in London; the factories of Lyon had received a major order for the taffeta needed to manufacture the lighter-than-air vehicle; lastly the British government put the cargo boat Resolute, skippered by Captain Pennet, at the doctor’s disposal.
Instantly thousands offered him encouragement, thousands bombarded him with congratulations. Meanwhile details of the undertaking were published in the bulletins of the Paris Geographical Society; a notable article appeared in Monsieur V. A. Malte-Brun’s New Annals of Travel, Geography, History, and Archaeology; a probing piece by Dr. W. Koner saw print in the Zeitschrift für Allgemeine Erdkunde,3 triumphantly revealing the journey’s potential, its chances of success, the nature of the obstacles ahead, the immense advantages of an airborne mode of travel; it criticized only the journey’s starting point; instead it preferred Massawa, a little Ethiopian port from which James Bruce had set out in 1768 to search for the Nile’s headwaters. But it unreservedly admired Dr. Fergusson’s strength of mind and the bold-as-brass courage that could conceive and attempt such a journey.
The North American Review watched with little pleasure as England basked in all this glory; it laughed off the doctor’s proposal and invited him to push on to America while the going was good.
In short, without listing every periodical on the planet, there wasn’t a scientific forum from the Journal of Evangelical Missions to the Algerian and Colonial Review, from the Annals of the Propagation of the Faith to the Church Missionary Reporter, that didn’t go into every aspect of this affair.
In London and across England, folks wagered sizable sums: 1) on whether Dr. Fergusson was a real or imaginary being; 2) on the journey itself, which some said wouldn’t even be attempted and others said would be carried out in full; 3) on the issue of determining if it succeeded or not; 4) on the likelihood or unlikelihood of Dr. Fergusson ever coming back. The bookmakers logged enormous amounts on these wagers, as if they were taking bets at Epsom Downs.
As a consequence, believers, skeptics, dunces, and scholars all kept their eyes on the doctor; he became the lion of the day, without ever suspecting that he sported a mane. He was happy to provide detailed information on his expedition. He was easy to approach and the most straightforward fellow on earth. More than one bold adventurer turned up, eager to share in the glory and dangers of his endeavor; but the doctor refused without giving any reasons for his refusal.
Many inventors of gadgets devised for steering balloons came and proposed their methods to him. He wasn’t in the market. To anybody who asked if he himself had discovered something of the sort, he consistently refused to elaborate and became more energetically involved than ever in the preparations for his journey.
chapter 3
The doctor’s friend—where their friendship dated from—Dick Kennedy in London—an unexpected and unsettling proposition—a discouraging proverb—a few names from Africa’s death register—advantages of a lighter-than-air vehicle—Dr. Fergusson’s secret.
Dr. Fergusson had a friend. Not an alter ego, not a second self; a friendship couldn’t exist between two perfectly identical beings.
But even though they boasted different traits, abilities, and personalities, Dick Kennedy and Samuel Fergusson marched to the exact same drummer, which didn’t seriously bother them. On the contrary.
This Dick Kennedy fellow was a Scot in the fullest sense of the word—outgoing, decisive, bullheaded. He lived in the little town of Leith near Edinburgh, actually a suburb of “Auld Reekie.”* He was sometimes a fisherman but at all times and places an avid hunter, not a bit surprising for a native of Caledonia who had done a little mountain climbing in the Highlands. He was renowned as a marvelous shot with a rifle; not only did he split bullets on a knife blade, he cut them into two equal halves—and if you weighed them afterward, you wouldn’t find any noticeable difference.
Kennedy’s looks strongly reminded you of the fiery Halbert Glen dinning as described by Sir Walter Scott in The Monastery; he stood over six English feet in height;1 limber and alert, he seemed to be blessed with Herculean strength; a face deeply tanned by the sun, dark keen eyes, a bold and resolute nature; in sum, there was something solid and decent in the entire person of this Scot, and it boded well.
Dick Kennedy
The two friends got to know each other in India, back when they both belonged to the same regiment; while Dick was hunting tigers and elephants, Samuel was hunting plants and insects; each could boast of being adept at his line of work, and more than one rare plant fell prey to the doctor, who valued this kind of conquest as much as any pair of ivory tusks.
These two young men never had a chance to rescue each other or to end up in each other’s debt. Which means they had a lasting friendship. Fate sometimes kept them apart, but their mutual liking always brought them back together.
After their return to England, they were often separated by the doctor’s expeditions abroad; but when he came back, he never failed to visit his Scottish friend and give a few weeks of himself unasked.
Dick chatted about the past, Samuel planned for the future: one looked forward, the other back. Hence Fergusson had a restless mind, while Kennedy was content with his lot.
After his trip to Tibet, the doctor went nearly two years without any talk of further exploring; Dick assumed that his urge to travel, his craving for adventure, had simmered down. To the hunter’s relief. He figured that sooner or later the doctor was bound to come to a bad end; you can be an old hand with the human race and still not journey with impunity among cannibals and wild animals; so Kennedy urged Samuel to rest on his laurels, since he had done enough for science and more than enough to earn the gratitude of his fellow man.
To which the doctor was content to say nothing. He continued to look thoughtful, then indulged in mysterious calculations, spent his nights slaving over figures, even experimented with odd gadgets nobody could make sense of. You could tell that some grand idea was fermenting in his brain.
“What can he be working on?” Kennedy wondered, when his friend left him and spent the month of January back in London.
He found out one morning from that article in the Daily Telegraph.
“Merciful God!” he exclaimed. “That madman!
