The district was quite deserted, and they had no reason to fear any legal penalty.
In an hour and a half they reached the gourbi.

Everything was just as they had left it, and it was evident that no one had visited the place during their absence.

All was desolate as the shore they had quitted.
The preparations for the expedition were brief and simple.

Ben Zoof saddled the horses and filled his pouch with biscuits and game; water, he felt certain, could be obtained in abundance from the numerous affluents of the Shelif, which, although they had now become tributaries of the Mediterranean, still meandered through the plain.

Captain Servadac mounted his horse Zephyr, and Ben Zoof simultaneously got astride his mare Galette, named after the mill of Montmartre.