Explore "Off on a Comet" by Jules Verne on Textopian. Read with annotations and highlights.
Composed of mud and loose stones, and covered with a thatch of turf and / straw, known to the natives by the name of "driss," the gourbi, though a / grade better than the tents of the nomad Arabs, was yet far inferior / to any habitation built of brick or stone. It adjoined an old stone / hostelry, previously occupied by a detachment of engineers, and which / now afforded shelter for Ben Zoof and the two horses. It still / contained a considerable number of tools, such as mattocks, shovels, and / pick-axes.
Uncomfortable as was their temporary abode, Servadac and his attendant / made no complaints; neither of them was dainty in the matter either of / board or lodging. After dinner, leaving his orderly to stow away the / remains of the repast in what he was pleased to term the "cupboard of / his stomach. " Captain Servadac turned out into the open air to smoke his / pipe upon the edge of the cliff. The shades of night were drawing on. / An hour previously, veiled in heavy clouds, the sun had sunk below the / horizon that bounded the plain beyond the Shelif.