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reflection, the two men silently descended the
mountain and remounted their horses. Before evening they had reached
the Mediterranean. On their road they failed to discern a vestige of the
little town of Montenotte; like Tenes, of which not so much as a ruined
cottage was visible on the horizon, it seemed to be annihilated.
    On the following day, the 6th of January, the two men made a forced
march along the coast of the Mediterranean, which they found less
altered than the captain had at first supposed; but four villages had
entirely disappeared, and the headlands, unable to resist the shock of
the convulsion, had been detached from the mainland.
    The circuit of the island had been now completed, and the explorers,
after a period of sixty hours, found themselves once more beside the
ruins of their gourbi. Five days, or what, according to the established
order of things, would have been two days and a half, had been occupied
in tracing the boundaries of their new domain; and they had ascertained
beyond a doubt that they were the sole human inhabitants left upon the
island.
    "Well, sir, here you are, Governor General of Algeria!" exclaimed Ben
Zoof, as they reached the gourbi.
    "With not a soul to govern," gloomily rejoined the captain.
    "How so? Do you not reckon me?"
    "Pshaw! Ben Zoof, what are you?"
    "What am I? Why, I am the population."
    The captain deigned no reply, but, muttering some expressions of regret
for the fruitless trouble he had taken about his rondo, betook himself
to rest.

Chapter VII - Ben Zoof Watches in Vain
*
    In a few minutes the governor general and his population were asleep.
The gourbi being in ruins, they were obliged to put up with the best
accommodation they could find in the adjacent erection. It must be owned
that the captain's slumbers were by no means sound; he was agitated by
the consciousness that he had hitherto been unable to account for his
strange experiences by any reasonable theory. Though far from being
advanced in the knowledge of natural philosophy, he had been instructed,
to a certain degree, in its elementary principles; and, by an effort
of memory, he managed to recall some general laws which he had almost
forgotten. He could understand that an altered inclination of the
earth's axis with regard to the ecliptic would introduce a change of
position in the cardinal points, and bring about a displacement of
the sea; but the hypothesis entirely failed to account, either for the
shortening of the days, or for the diminution in the pressure of the
atmosphere. He felt that his judgment was utterly baffled; his only
remaining hope was that the chain of marvels was not yet complete, and
that something farther might throw some light upon the mystery.
    Ben Zoof's first care on the following morning was to provide a
good breakfast. To use his own phrase, he was as hungry as the
whole population of three million Algerians, of whom he was the
representative, and he must have enough to eat. The catastrophe which
had overwhelmed the country had left a dozen eggs uninjured, and upon
these, with a good dish of his famous couscous, he hoped that he and his
master might have a sufficiently substantial meal. The stove was ready
for use, the copper skillet was as bright as hands could make it, and
the beads of condensed steam upon the surface of a large stone al-caraza
gave evidence that it was supplied with water. Ben Zoof at once lighted
a fire, singing all the time, according to his wont, a snatch of an old
military refrain.
    Ever on the lookout for fresh phenomena, Captain Servadac watched the
preparations with a curious eye. It struck him that perhaps the air,
in its strangely modified condition, would fail to supply sufficient
oxygen, and that the stove, in consequence, might not fulfill its
function. But no; the fire was lighted just as usual, and fanned into
vigor by Ben Zoof applying his mouth in lieu of bellows, and a bright
flame started up from the midst of the twigs and coal. The skillet