During the American Civil War, the city of Richmond, Virginia, is plagued by famine and death. The city is siege, and everyone is looking for a way to escape. Five prisoners of war decide to resort to an unlikely form of escape: a hot-air ba ...Read More

It was now exactly seven months since the balloon voyagers had been thrown on Lincoln Island. During that time, the researches they had made, no human being had been discovered. No smoke even had betrayed the presence of man on the surface of the island. No vestiges of his handiwork showed that either at an early or at a late period had man lived there. Not only did it now appear to be uninhabited by any but themselves, but the colonists were compelled to believe that it never had been inhabited. And now, all this scaffolding of reasonings fell before a simple ball of metal, found in the body of an inoffensive rodent! In fact, this bullet must have issued from a firearm, and who but a human being could have used such a weapon? ...Read More

It was now two years and a half since the castaways from the balloon had been thrown on Lincoln and during that period there had been no communication between them and their fellow-creatures. Once the reporter had attempted to communicate with the inhabited world by confiding to a bird a letter which contained the secret of their situation, but that was a chance on which it was impossible to reckon seriously. Ayrton, alone, under the circumstances which have been re-lated, had come to join the little colony. Now, suddenly, on this day, the 17th of October, other men had unexpectedly ap-peared in sight of the island, on that deserted sea! ...Read More