A Journey to the Centre of the Earth
They were delicious words, but I had little hope.
Soon however, about a quarter of an hour later I heard a voice above me,
at one of the upper fireplaces.
"Are you below or above?"
"Below," was my reply.
In an instant a basket was lowered with milk, a biscuit, and an egg. My
uncle was fearful to be too ready with his supply of food. I drank the
milk first, for thirst had nearly deadened hunger. I then, much
refreshed, ate my bread and hard egg.
They were now at work at the wall. I could hear a pickax. Wishing to
escape all danger from this terrible weapon I made a desperate struggle,
and the belt, which surrounded my waist and which had been hitched on a
stone, gave way. I was free, and only escaped falling down by a rapid
motion of my hands and knees.
In ten minutes more I was in my uncle's arms, after being two days and
nights in that horrible prison. My occasional delirium prevented me from
counting time.
I was weeks recovering from that awful starvation adventure; and yet
what was that to the hideous sufferings I now endured?
After dreaming for some time, and thinking of this and other matters, I
once more looked around me. We were still ascending with fearful
rapidity. Every now and then the air appeared to check our respiration
as it does that of aeronauts when the ascension of the balloon is too
rapid. But if they feel a degree of cold in proportion to the elevation
they attain in the atmosphere, we experienced quite a contrary effect.
The heat began to increase in a most threatening and exceptional manner.
I cannot tell exactly the mean, but I think it must have reached one
hundred twenty-two degrees Fahrenheit.
What was the meaning of this extraordinary change in the temperature? As
far as we had hitherto gone, facts had proved the theories of Davy and
of Lidenbrock to be correct. Until now, all the peculiar conditions of
refractory rocks, of electricity, of magnetism, had modified the general
laws of nature, and had created for us a moderate temperature; for the
theory of the central fire, remained, in my eyes, the only explainable
one.
Were we, then, going to reach a position in which these phenomena were
to be carried out in all their rigor, and in which the heat would reduce
the rocks to a state of fusion?
Such was my not unnatural fear, and I did not conceal the fact from my
uncle. My way of doing so might be cold and heartless, but I could not
help it.
"If we are not drowned, or smashed into pancakes, and if we do not die
of starvation, we have the satisfaction of knowing that we must be
burned alive."
My uncle, in presence of this brusque attack, simply shrugged his
shoulders, and resumed his reflections--whatever they might be.
An hour passed away, and except that there was a slight increase in the
temperature no incident modified the situation.
My uncle at last, of his own accord, broke silence.
"Well, Henry, my boy," he said, in a cheerful way, "we must make up our
minds."
"Make up our minds to what?" I asked, in considerable surprise.
"Well--to something. We must at whatever risk recruit our physical
strength. If we make the fatal mistake of husbanding our little remnant
of food, we may probably prolong our wretched existence a few hours--but
we shall remain weak to the end."
"Yes," I growled, "to the end. That, however, will not keep us long
waiting."
"Well, only let a chance of safety present itself--only allow that a
moment of action be necessary--where shall we find the means of action
if we allow ourselves to be reduced to physical weakness by inanition?"
"When this piece of meat is devoured, Uncle, what hope will there remain
unto us?"
"None, my dear Henry, none. But will it do you any good to devour it
with your eyes? You appear to me to reason like one without will or
decision, like a being without energy."
"Then," cried I, exasperated to a degree which is scarcely to be
explained, "you do not mean to tell me--that you--that you--have not
lost all hope."
"Certainly not," replied the Professor with consummate coolness.
"You mean to tell me, Uncle, that we shall get out of this monstrous
subterranean shaft?"
"While there is life there is hope. I beg to assert, Henry, that as long
as a man's heart beats, as long as a man's flesh quivers, I do not allow
that a being gifted with thought and will can allow himself to despair."
What a nerve! The man placed in a position like that we occupied must
have been very brave to speak like this.
"Well," I cried, "what do you mean to do?"
"Eat what remains of the food we have in our hands; let us swallow the
last crumb. It will bel Heaven willing, our last repast. Well, never
mind--instead of being exhausted skeletons, we shall be men."
"True," muttered I in a despairing tone, "let us take our fill."
"We must," replied my uncle, with a deep sigh, "call it what you will."
My uncle took a piece of the meat that remained, and some crusts of
biscuit which had escaped the wreck. He divided the whole into three
parts.
Each had one pound of food to last him as long as he remained in the
interior of the earth.
Each now acted in accordance with his own private character.
My uncle, the Professor, ate greedily, but evidently without appetite,
eating simply from some mechanical motion. I put the food inside my
lips, and hungry as I was, chewed my morsel without pleasure, and
without satisfaction.
Hans, the guide, just as if he had been eider-down hunting, swallowed
every mouthful, as though it were a usual affair. He looked like a man
equally prepared to enjoy superfluity or total want.
Hans, in all probability, was no more used to starvation than ourselves,
but his hardy Icelandic nature had prepared him for many sufferings. As
long as he received his three rix-dollars every Saturday night, he was
prepared for anything.
The fact was, Hans never troubled himself about much except his money.
He had undertaken to serve a certain man at so much per week, and no
matter what evils befell his employer or himself, he never found fault
or grumbled, so long as his wages were duly paid.
Suddenly my uncle roused himself. He had seen a smile on the face of our
guide. I could not make it out.
"What is the matter?" said my uncle.
"Schiedam," said the guide, producing a bottle of this precious fluid.
We drank. My uncle and myself will own to our dying day that hence we
derived strength to exist until the last bitter moment. That precious
bottle of Hollands was in reality only half full; but, under the
circumstances, it was nectar.
It took some minutes for myself and my uncle to form a decided opinion
on the subject. The worthy Professor swallowed about half a pint and did
not seem able to drink any more.
"<i>Fortrafflig</i>," said Hans, swallowing nearly all that was left.
"Excellent--very good," said my uncle, with as much gusto as if he had
just left the steps of the club at Hamburg.
I had begun to feel as if there had been one gleam of hope. Now all
thought of the future vanished!
We had consumed our last ounce of food, and it was five o'clock in the
morning!
CHAPTER 42
THE VOLCANIC SHAFT
Man's constitution is so peculiar that his health is purely a negative
matter. No sooner is the rage of hunger appeased than it becomes
difficult to comprehend the meaning of starvation. It is only when you
suffer that you really understand.
As to anyone who has not endured privation having any notion of the
matter, it is simply absurd.
With us, after a long fast, some mouthfuls of bread and meat, a little
moldy biscuit and salt beef triumphed over all our previous gloomy and
saturnine thoughts.
Nevertheless, after this repast each gave way to his own reflections. I
wondered what were those of Hans--the man of the extreme north, who was
yet gifted with the fatalistic resignation of Oriental character. But
the utmost stretch of the imagination would not allow me to realize the
truth. As for my individual self, my thoughts had ceased to be anything
but memories of the past, and were all connected with that upper world
which I never should have left. I saw it all now, the beautiful house in
the Konigstrasse, my poor Gretchen, the good Martha; they all passed
before my mind like visions of the past. Every time any of the
lugubrious groanings which were to be distinguished in the hollows
around fell upon my ears, I fancied I heard the distant murmur of the
great cities above my head.
As for my uncle, always thinking of his science, he examined the nature
of the shaft by means of a torch. He closely examined the different
strata one above the other, in order to recognize his situation by
geological theory. This calculation, or rather this estimation, could by
no means be anything but approximate. But a learned man, a philosopher,
is nothing if not a philosopher, when he keeps his ideas calm and
collected; and certainly the Professor possessed this quality to
perfection.
I heard him, as I sat in silence, murmuring words of geological science.
As I understood his object and his meaning, I could not but interest
myself despite my preoccupation in that terrible hour.
"Eruptive granite," he said to himself, "we are still in the primitive
epoch. But we are going up--going up, still going up. But who knows? Who
knows?"
Then he still hoped. He felt along the vertical sides of the shaft with
his hand, and some few minutes later, he would go on again in the
following style:
"This is gneiss. This is mica schist--siliceous mineral. Good again;
this is the epoch of transition, at all events, we are close to
them--and then, and then--"
What could the Professor mean? Could he, by any conceivable means,
measure the thickness of the crust of the earth suspended above our
heads? Did he possess any possible means of making any approximation to
this calculation? No.
The manometer was wanting, and no summary estimation could take the
place of it.
And yet, as we progressed, the temperature increased in the most
extraordinary degree, and I began to feel as if I were bathed in a hot
and burning atmosphere. Never before had I felt anything like it. I
could only compare it to the hot vapor from an iron foundry, when the
liquid iron is in a state of ebullition and runs over. By degrees, and
one after the other, Hans, my uncle, and myself had taken off our coats
and waistcoats. They were unbearable. Even the slightest garment was not
only uncomfortable, but the cause of extreme suffering.
"Are we ascending to a living fire?" I cried; when, to my horror and
astonishment, the heat became greater than before.
"No, no," said my uncle, "it is simply impossible, quite impossible."
"And yet," said I, touching the side of the shaft with my naked hand,
"this wall is literally burning."
At this moment, feeling as I did that the sides of this extraordinary
wall were red hot, I plunged my hands into the water to cool them. I
drew them back with a cry of despair.
"The water is boiling!" I cried.
My uncle, the Professor, made no reply other than a gesture of rage and
despair.
Something very like the truth had probably struck his imagination.
But I could take no share in either what was going on, or in his
speculations. An invincible dread had taken possession of my brain and
soul. I could only look forward to an immediate catastrophe, such a
catastrophe as not even the most vivid imagination could have thought
of. An idea, at first vague and uncertain, was gradually being changed
into certainty.
I tremulously rejected it at first, but it forced itself upon me by
degrees with extreme obstinacy. It was so terrible an idea that I
scarcely dared to whisper it to myself.
And yet all the while certain, and as it were, involuntary observations