and it was ten at night by this Grinnage clock. Well,
at this time of the year the sun sets at about seven
o’clock. Now I noticed the time yesterday evening
when the sun went down, and it was half-past five
o’clock by the Grinnage clock, and half past 11 A.M.
by my watch and the other clock. You see, the sun
rose and set by my watch in St. Louis, and the Grin-
nage clock was six hours fast; but we’ve come so far
east that it comes within less than half an hour of set-
ting by the Grinnage clock now, and I’m away out —
more than four hours and a half out. You see, that
meant that we was closing up on the longitude of
Ireland, and would strike it before long if we was
p’inted right — which we wasn’t. No, sir, we’ve been
a-wandering — wandering ‘way down south of east, and
it’s my opinion we are in Africa. Look at this map.
You see how the shoulder of Africa sticks out to the
west. Think how fast we’ve traveled; if we had gone
straight east we would be long past England by this
time. You watch for noon, all of you, and we’ll stand
up, and when we can’t cast a shadow we’ll find that
this Grinnage clock is coming mighty close to marking
twelve. Yes, sir, I think we’re in Africa; and it’s just
bully.”
Jim was gazing down with the glass. He shook his
head and says:
“Mars Tom, I reckon dey’s a mistake som’er’s.
hain’t seen no niggers yit.”
“That’s nothing; they don’t live in the desert.
What is that, ‘way off yonder? Gimme a glass.”
He took a long look, and said it was like a black
string stretched across the sand, but he couldn’t guess
what it was.
“Well,” I says, “I reckon maybe you’ve got a
chance now to find out whereabouts this balloon is,
because as like as not that is one of these lines here,
that’s on the map, that you call meridians of longi-
tude, and we can drop down and look at its number,
and –”
“Oh, shucks, Huck Finn, I never see such a lunk-
head as you. Did you s’pose there’s meridians of
longitude on the EARTH?”
“Tom Sawyer, they’re set down on the map, and
you know it perfectly well, and here they are, and you
can see for yourself.”
“Of course they’re on the map, but that’s nothing;
there ain’t any on the GROUND.”
“Tom, do you know that to be so?”
“Certainly I do.”
“Well, then, that map’s a liar again. I never see
such a liar as that map.”
He fired up at that, and I was ready for him, and
Jim was warming his opinion, too, and next minute
we’d ‘a’ broke loose on another argument, if Tom
hadn’t dropped the glass and begun to clap his hands
like a maniac and sing out:
“Camels! — Camels!”
So I grabbed a glass and Jim, too, and took a look,
but I was disappointed, and says:
“Camels your granny; they’re spiders.”
“Spiders in a desert, you shad? Spiders walking
in a procession? You don’t ever reflect, Huck Finn,
and I reckon you really haven’t got anything to
reflect WITH. Don’t you know we’re as much as a
mile up in the air, and that that string of crawlers is
two or three miles away? Spiders, good land! Spiders
as big as a cow? Perhaps you’d like to go down
and milk one of ’em. But they’re camels, just the
same. It’s a caravan, that’s what it is, and it’s a mile
long.”
“Well, then, let’s go down and look at it. I
don’t believe in it, and ain’t going to till I see it and
know it.”
“All right,” he says, and give the command:
“Lower away.”
As we come slanting down into the hot weather, we
could see that it was camels, sure enough, plodding
along, an everlasting string of them, with bales strapped
to them, and several hundred men in long white robes,
and a thing like a shawl bound over their heads and
hanging down with tassels and fringes; and some of