| But while so many catastrophes were taking place on land and at sea, a drama not less exciting was being enacted in the agitated air. | В то самое время, когда на суше и на воде происходило столько ужасных бедствий, в воздухе разыгрывалась не менее страшная драма. |
| In fact, a balloon, as a ball might be carried on the summit of a waterspout, had been taken into the circling movement of a column of air and had traversed space at the rate of ninety miles an hour, turning round and round as if seized by some aerial maelstrom. | Аэростат, уносимый смерчем, вертелся в бешеном вихре, словно маленький шарик. Непрестанно крутясь в воздушном водовороте, он несся вперед со скоростью девяноста мильв час. |
| Beneath the lower point of the balloon swung a car, containing five passengers, scarcely visible in the midst of the thick vapor mingled with spray which hung over the surface of the ocean. | Под нижней частью шара качалась корзина с пятью пассажирами, едва видимыми в густых, пропитанных водяной пылью облаках, нависших над самым океаном. |
| Whence, it may be asked, had come that plaything of the tempest? | Откуда взялся этот шар - беспомощная игрушка страшной бури? |
| From what part of the world did it rise? | В какой точке земли поднялся он на воздух? |
| It surely could not have started during the storm. | Он не мог, разумеется, пуститься в путь во время урагана. |
| But the storm had raged five days already, and the first symptoms were manifested on the 18th. | А ураган длился уже пятый день. |
| It cannot be doubted that the balloon came from a great distance, for it could not have traveled less than two thousand miles in twenty-four hours. | Значит, шар примчался откуда-то издалека. Ведь в сутки он пролетал не менее двух тысяч миль. |
| At any rate the passengers, destitute of all marks for their guidance, could not have possessed the means of reckoning the route traversed since their departure. | Во всяком случае, его пассажиры не имели возможности определить пройденное ими расстояние. |
| It was a remarkable fact that, although in the very midst of the furious tempest, they did not suffer from it. | Им не на что было ориентироваться. |
| They were thrown about and whirled round and round without feeling the rotation in the slightest degree, or being sensible that they were removed from a horizontal position. |