our programme provided for a landing about midday, I had a 

 reserve which should have let us remain shut up in our cabin until 

 sunset. Provided, at least, that we could keep the cabin airtight. 

 Having felt several times, in our ears, a sudden lowering of pressure, 

 we perceived that we were once more losing air through the hole near 

 the insulator ; the vaseline had run out through the tow. So the struggle 

 for life began again. The longer the trip took, the greater was the danger 

 of reaching the Adriatic. We had a drift indicator which hung 50 yards 

 below the car. As long as land was visible, it permitted us to determine 

 our speed and the' direction of our drift. The direction was, in fact, 

 towards the Adriatic. Our speed was, luckily, very low: if it did not 

 increase we were sure not to leave terra firma during the day. In the 

 stratosphere the wind is often very violent. On certain days it would 

 have borne us as far as above the Persian Gulf. If I had known the 

 mountains which surrounded us, I could have found our position. 

 But the view was too often obstructed by clouds to permit us to 

 follow our course on a map. It would not have helped us much any- 

 way. We could do nothing about it and all we could do was to await 

 the turn of events. 



As a last stroke of ill-luck, one of the large mercury barometers 

 broke as the result of an awkward movement. The liquid metal flowed 

 to the bottom of the cabin. Now, in certain cases, aluminium can be 

 rapidly eaten away by mercury. Fortunately a good layer of paint 

 protected the cabin. Nevertheless the presence of mercury was not 

 reassuring. If only we had possessed a little pump with which we could 

 have sucked it up ! We had with us a rubber tube. If only, we thought, 

 we had had a vacuum cleaner! As a matter of fact, never had a physicist 

 at his disposal more vacuum than we had! The whole stratosphere 

 was at our disposal. We connected our tube with a tap which led 

 outside and we placed the other end on the cabin floor. The mercury 

 was sucked up and thrown outside as well as the condensed water 

 which had accumulated at the bottom of the sphere. But we hadn't 

 come to the end of our difficulties. 



We had departed before sunrise and we had traversed at high speed 

 those zones where the temperature was between 50° and 75° C. below 

 zero. The walls of the cabin were then very cold and its interior 

 was rapidly covered by a good layer of frost. It was as if we were in a 

 drop of crystal. If the situation had lasted, we should have suffered 

 seriously from the cold. But soon the sun rose, the stratospheric sun. 



[12] 



