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The Great Airship

BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
50 Old Bailey, LONDON
17 Stanhope Street, GLASGOW

BLACKIE & SON (INDIA) LIMITED
Warwick House, Fort Street, BOMBAY

BLACKIE & SON (CANADA) LIMITED
1118 Bay Street, TORONTO

[Illustration: "AIRSHIP IN SIGHT, SIR!"

_Page_ 180

_Frontispiece_]




The Great Airship

A Tale of Adventure

BY

LT.-COL. F. S. BRERETON


Author of "A Boy of the Dominion" "The Hero of Panama" "On the Field of
Waterloo" "John Bargreave's Gold" &c.


_Illustrated by C. M. Padday_

BLACKIE & SON LIMITED
LONDON AND GLASGOW

       *       *       *       *       *

By Lt.-Col. F. S. Brereton


On the Field of Waterloo.
The Great Airship.
With the Allies to the Rhine.
Under French's Command.
Colin the Scout.
With Allenby in Palestine.
A Hero of Panama.
Foes of the Red Cockade.
Under the Chinese Dragon.
A Sturdy Young Canadian.
How Canada was Won.
John Bargreave's Gold.
With Shield and Assegai.
With Rifle and Bayonet.
In the King's Service.
The Dragon of Pekin.
One of the Fighting Scouts.
A Knight of St. John.
Roger the Bold.
The Rough Riders of the Pampas.
Indian and Scout.
The Great Aeroplane.
Tom Stapleton.
A Boy of the Dominion.

_Printed in Great Britain by Blackie & Son, Limited, Glasgow_




Contents


CHAP.                                                      Page

I. THE FAME OF THE ZEPPELIN                                   9

II. ANDREW PROVOST'S RESOLUTION                              25

III. DICKY HAMSHAW, MIDSHIPMAN                               42

IV. THE GREAT AIRSHIP                                        58

V. A TOUR OF INSPECTION                                      77

VI. CARL REITBERG, SPORTSMAN                                 94

VII. EN ROUTE FOR ADRIANOPLE                                111

VIII. THE BESIEGED CITY                                     126

IX. DICK HAMSHAW SAVES THE SITUATION                        144

X. A THRILLING RESCUE                                       166

XI. SOME FACTS AND FIGURES                                  187

XII. CARL ABOARD THE BIPLANE                                203

XIII. TO THE NORTH-WEST FRONTIER                            222

XIV. A BRUSH WITH PATHANS                                   243

XV. THE GREAT ATTEMPT                                       260

XVI. RECORD HIGH FLYING                                     277

XVII. A DESPERATE SITUATION                                 297

XVIII. OFF TO NEW GUINEA                                    313

XIX. SAVED FROM THE NATIVES                                 331

XX. ADOLF FRUHMANN'S VENTURE                                349




Illustrations


                                                    Facing Page
"AIRSHIP IN SIGHT, SIR!"                           Frontispiece

ARRIVED WITH A BUMP FACING COMMANDER JACKSON                 80

THE COLLAPSE OF CARL REITBERG                               272

THE QUARTET SET OUT FOR THE AIRSHIP                         320




THE GREAT AIRSHIP




CHAPTER I

The Fame of the Zeppelin


There are exceptions, we suppose, to almost every rule, and this
particular Friday towards the end of June was such an exception. It was
fine. Not a cloud flecked the sun-lit sky. A glorious blue expanse hung
over a sea almost as blue, but criss-crossed in all directions by the
curling white tops of tiny wavelets, all that remained to remind one of
the atrocious weather which had prevailed. For the North Sea, Europe,
Great Britain, everywhere in fact, had been treated to a succession of
violent gales, to a continuous deluge of rain, to bitter hail, and
squalls of snow in some parts. And here and now, off the mouth of the
river Elbe the sun shone, the sky was a delight, a balmy breeze fanned
the cheeks of the passengers crowding the decks of the Hamburg-Amerika
liner.

"What a change! I began to wonder whether there was such a season as
summer. Have a cigar?"

Mr. Andrew Provost drew from an inner pocket of his jacket a
silver-mounted case, pulled the lid off and offered one of the contents
to his nephew.

"Not that one, Joe," he said, as the young man beside him placed his
long fingers on one of the weeds. "It's Dutch. Not that they're not good
smokes; I like 'em sometimes. But give me a Havana, and offer one to
your friends. There! That one! You'll like it."

"Thanks! I know 'em, Uncle. You always give me your best."

There was a smile on the handsome face of the young man as he obeyed the
directions of his Uncle Andrew. It was obvious indeed from their smiles,
the manner in which they paced the deck arm in arm, and from the
intimacy of their conversation, that the two were on the best of terms.
And why not? They were related, as we have stated. Then they had for
long been separated. Mr. Andrew Provost had not always been the
comfortable-looking individual he now appeared. For prosperous and
comfortable he looked without a doubt. Florid and sunburned, with white
hair and moustache which made his complexion seem to be even more ruddy,
he was tall, and slight, and gracefully if not robustly built. There was
something of a military air about him, and we whisper the truth when we
say that he was often enough taken for an old soldier, much to his own
secret gratification. Dark grey eyes looked out genially from a smiling
face upon the world and his fellows. His forehead was hardly seamed.
Care, in fact, seemed to have failed in its effort to reach him, or,
more likely perhaps, his genial, plucky nature had caused it to fall
easily from his shoulders. For the rest he was exceedingly well groomed,
and looked what he was, a prosperous, healthy gentleman.

"But it wasn't always like that, Joe," he told his companion, as they
paced the deck, basking in the sun. "Your Uncle Andrew wasn't always the
stylish dog he looks now. Not by a long way. I've been on my beam ends."

"Ah! Exactly."

"Know what that means?"

"To a certain extent. When you came home last Christmas I was down in
the dumps. Absolutely on my beam ends."

Andrew Provost turned to look with some astonishment at his nephew. He
inspected him critically from the top of his glossy Homburg hat to the
well-polished brown shoes which he wore. And the face finally drew all
his attention.

"Impossible!" he declared politely. "Joe on his beam ends! Joe in the
dumps--never!"

"True as possible, sir--I was desperate," repeated Joe, his face grave
for that moment.

"Well, well, perhaps so. I'm forgetting. I was young like you when I was
down. Young fellows make light of such matters. It's as well, perhaps,
or the world wouldn't go along half so easily. But I'd never have
thought it, Joe. You never said a word to me; you look so jolly."

No one would have denied the fact. Joe Gresson looked what he was, a
handsome, jovial fellow of twenty-seven. Fair and tall, and broader than
his uncle, he had deep-set eyes which gave to his smiling face an air of
cleverness. And the young fellow was undoubtedly clever. An engineer by
profession, he had graduated at Cambridge, had passed through the shops,
the drawing office, and other departments of one of the biggest
engineering concerns in England, and had finally struck out a line for
himself. He had been experimenting for the past four years.

"What's the good of being miserable because things don't go right,
Uncle?" he said with a smile. "I've told you how I took up engineering.
Well, I thought I had a good idea. I left the shops at Barrow and worked
on my own. Thanks to the few thousands I possessed I was able to carry
out some important experiments."

"Ah, my boy! Well, you succeeded?"

"Yes and no; I went so far with the work that I was sure that success
was possible. Then there was an accident. The whole affair was wrecked,
and I woke up to find myself without funds and in a terrible condition
of despair."

"On your beam ends, in fact--well, like me," said Mr. Andrew. "I'll tell
you about myself; then you'll give your yarn. I'll have to hear what
this work was. But my tale don't take long. Let's step up and down again
and I'll give it to you. Let's see--yes, I was a fiery, unmanageable
young idiot."

"Never!" interjected Joe.

"Like many other young fellows," proceeded Andrew, as if he had not been
interrupted. "I bluntly refused the post which my father offered me, and
cut away from home. I went to Canada, worked my way out aboard the
steamer, a cockleshell in those days, and half starved for the next few
months, for it was in the winter and there was no work to be had. But I
learned something. In the six months which followed my landing I acted
as a cook's boy, a porter, a fireman, and a clerk in a grocery store.
That's where I had my eyes opened. The country was opening up. I had
saved a few dollars. I set up a store of my own in one of the nearest
settlements, a mere hut knocked together with the help of a hammer and
some nails. But it paid. I saved all along. I built a real brick house,
and the sales went up like wildfire. Then I chose a manager and opened
up a second store away in the nearest