Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea
thoughts, and answered of his own accord the questions which I was
burning to address to him.
“The greater part of these dishes are unknown to you,” he said to me.
“However, you may partake of them without fear. They are wholesome and
nourishing. For a long time I have renounced the food of the earth, and
am never ill now. My crew, who are healthy, are fed on the same food.”
“So,” said I, “all these eatables are the produce of the sea?”
“Yes, Professor, the sea supplies all my wants. Sometimes I cast my
nets in tow, and I draw them in ready to break. Sometimes I hunt in the
midst of this element, which appears to be inaccessible to man, and
quarry the game which dwells in my submarine forests. My flocks, like
those of Neptune’s old shepherds, graze fearlessly in the immense
prairies of the ocean. I have a vast property there, which I cultivate
myself, and which is always sown by the hand of the Creator of all
things.”
“I can understand perfectly, sir, that your nets furnish excellent fish
for your table; I can understand also that you hunt aquatic game in
your submarine forests; but I cannot understand at all how a particle
of meat, no matter how small, can figure in your bill of fare.”
“This, which you believe to be meat, Professor, is nothing else than
fillet of turtle. Here are also some dolphins’ livers, which you take
to be ragout of pork. My cook is a clever fellow, who excels in
dressing these various products of the ocean. Taste all these dishes.
Here is a preserve of holothuria, which a Malay would declare to be
unrivalled in the world; here is a cream, of which the milk has been
furnished by the cetacea, and the sugar by the great fucus of the North
Sea; and lastly, permit me to offer you some preserve of anemones,
which is equal to that of the most delicious fruits.”
I tasted, more from curiosity than as a connoisseur, whilst Captain
Nemo enchanted me with his extraordinary stories.
“You like the sea, Captain?”
“Yes; I love it! The sea is everything. It covers seven-tenths of the
terrestrial globe. Its breath is pure and healthy. It is an immense
desert, where man is never lonely, for he feels life stirring on all
sides. The sea is only the embodiment of a supernatural and wonderful
existence. It is nothing but love and emotion; it is the ‘Living
Infinite,’ as one of your poets has said. In fact, Professor, Nature
manifests herself in it by her three kingdoms, mineral, vegetable, and
animal. The sea is the vast reservoir of Nature. The globe began with
sea, so to speak; and who knows if it will not end with it? In it is
supreme tranquillity. The sea does not belong to despots. Upon its
surface men can still exercise unjust laws, fight, tear one another to
pieces, and be carried away with terrestrial horrors. But at thirty
feet below its level, their reign ceases, their influence is quenched,
and their power disappears. Ah! sir, live—live in the bosom of the
waters! There only is independence! There I recognise no masters! There
I am free!”
Captain Nemo suddenly became silent in the midst of this enthusiasm, by
which he was quite carried away. For a few moments he paced up and
down, much agitated. Then he became more calm, regained his accustomed
coldness of expression, and turning towards me—
“Now, Professor,” said he, “if you wish to go over the _Nautilus_, I am
at your service.”
Captain Nemo rose. I followed him. A double door, contrived at the back
of the dining-room, opened, and I entered a room equal in dimensions to
that which I had just quitted.
It was a library. High pieces of furniture, of black violet ebony
inlaid with brass, supported upon their wide shelves a great number of
books uniformly bound. They followed the shape of the room, terminating
at the lower part in huge divans, covered with brown leather, which
were curved, to afford the greatest comfort. Light movable desks, made
to slide in and out at will, allowed one to rest one’s book while
reading. In the centre stood an immense table, covered with pamphlets,
amongst which were some newspapers, already of old date. The electric
light flooded everything; it was shed from four unpolished globes half
sunk in the volutes of the ceiling. I looked with real admiration at
this room, so ingeniously fitted up, and I could scarcely believe my
eyes.
“Captain Nemo,” said I to my host, who had just thrown himself on one
of the divans, “this is a library which would do honour to more than
one of the continental palaces, and I am absolutely astounded when I
consider that it can follow you to the bottom of the seas.”
“Where could one find greater solitude or silence, Professor?” replied
Captain Nemo. “Did your study in the Museum afford you such perfect
quiet?”
“No, sir; and I must confess that it is a very poor one after yours.
You must have six or seven thousand volumes here.”
“Twelve thousand, M. Aronnax. These are the only ties which bind me to
the earth. But I had done with the world on the day when my _Nautilus_
plunged for the first time beneath the waters. That day I bought my
last volumes, my last pamphlets, my last papers, and from that time I
wish to think that men no longer think or write. These books,
Professor, are at your service besides, and you can make use of them
freely.”
I thanked Captain Nemo, and went up to the shelves of the library.
Works on science, morals, and literature abounded in every language;
but I did not see one single work on political economy; that subject
appeared to be strictly proscribed. Strange to say, all these books
were irregularly arranged, in whatever language they were written; and
this medley proved that the Captain of the _Nautilus_ must have read
indiscriminately the books which he took up by chance.
“Sir,” said I to the Captain, “I thank you for having placed this
library at my disposal. It contains treasures of science, and I shall
profit by them.”
“This room is not only a library,” said Captain Nemo, “it is also a
smoking-room.”
“A smoking-room!” I cried. “Then one may smoke on board?”
“Certainly.”
“Then, sir, I am forced to believe that you have kept up a
communication with Havannah.”
“Not any,” answered the Captain. “Accept this cigar, M. Aronnax; and,
though it does not come from Havannah, you will be pleased with it, if
you are a connoisseur.”
I took the cigar which was offered me; its shape recalled the London
ones, but it seemed to be made of leaves of gold. I lighted it at a
little brazier, which was supported upon an elegant bronze stem, and
drew the first whiffs with the delight of a lover of smoking who has
not smoked for two days.
“It is excellent, but it is not tobacco.”
“No!” answered the Captain, “this tobacco comes neither from Havannah
nor from the East. It is a kind of sea-weed, rich in nicotine, with
which the sea provides me, but somewhat sparingly.”
At that moment Captain Nemo opened a door which stood opposite to that
by which I had entered the library, and I passed into an immense
drawing-room splendidly lighted.
It was a vast four-sided room, thirty feet long, eighteen wide, and
fifteen high. A luminous ceiling, decorated with light arabesques, shed
a soft clear light over all the marvels accumulated in this museum. For
it was in fact a museum, in which an intelligent and prodigal hand had
gathered all the treasures of nature and art, with the artistic
confusion which distinguishes a painter’s studio.
Thirty first-rate pictures, uniformly framed, separated by bright
drapery, ornamented the walls, which were hung with tapestry of severe
design. I saw works of great value, the greater part of which I had
admired in the special collections of Europe, and in the exhibitions of
paintings. The several schools of the old masters were represented by a
Madonna of Raphael, a Virgin of Leonardo da Vinci, a nymph of Corregio,
a woman of Titan, an Adoration of Veronese, an Assumption of Murillo, a
portrait of Holbein, a monk of Velasquez, a martyr of Ribera, a fair of
Rubens, two Flemish landscapes of Teniers, three little “genre”
pictures of Gerard Dow, Metsu, and Paul Potter, two specimens of
Géricault and Prudhon, and some sea-pieces of Backhuysen and Vernet.
Amongst the works of modern painters were pictures with the signatures
of Delacroix, Ingres, Decamps, Troyon, Meissonier, Daubigny, etc.; and
some admirable statues in marble and bronze, after the finest antique
models, stood upon pedestals in the corners of this magnificent museum.
Amazement, as the Captain of the _Nautilus_ had predicted, had already
begun to take possession of me.
“Professor,” said this strange man, “you must excuse the unceremonious
way in which I receive you, and the disorder of this room.”
“Sir,” I answered, “without seeking to know who you are, I recognise in
you an artist.”
“An amateur, nothing more, sir. Formerly I loved to collect these
beautiful works created by the hand of man. I sought them greedily, and
ferreted them out indefatigably, and I have been able to bring together
some objects of great value. These are my last souvenirs of that world
which is dead to me. In my eyes, your modern artists are already old;
they have two or three thousand years of existence; I confound them in
my own mind. Masters have no age.”
“And these musicians?” said I, pointing out some works of Weber,
Rossini, Mozart, Beethoven, Haydn, Meyerbeer, Hérold, Wagner, Auber,
Gounod, and a number of others, scattered over a large model
piano-organ which occupied one of the panels of the drawing-room.
“These musicians,” replied Captain Nemo, “are the contemporaries of
Orpheus; for in the memory of the dead all chronological differences
are effaced; and I am dead, Professor; as much dead as those of your
friends who are sleeping six feet under the earth!”
Captain Nemo was silent, and seemed lost in a profound reverie. I
contemplated him with deep interest, analysing in silence the strange
expression of his countenance. Leaning on his elbow against an angle of
a costly mosaic table, he no longer saw me,—he had forgotten my
presence.
I did not disturb this reverie, and continued my observation of the
curiosities which enriched this drawing-room.
Under elegant glass cases, fixed by copper rivets, were classed and
labelled the most precious productions of the sea which had ever been
presented to the eye of a naturalist. My delight as a professor may be
conceived.
The division containing the zoophytes presented the most curious
specimens of the two groups of polypi and echinodermes. In the first
group, the tubipores, were gorgones arranged like a fan, soft sponges
of Syria, ises of the Moluccas, pennatules, an admirable virgularia of
the Norwegian seas, variegated unbellulairæ, alcyonariæ, a whole series
of madrepores, which my master Milne Edwards has so cleverly
classified, amongst which I remarked some wonderful flabellinæ oculinæ
of the Island of Bourbon, the “Neptune’s car” of the Antilles, superb
varieties of corals—in short, every species of those curious polypi of
which entire islands are formed, which will one day become continents.
Of the echinodermes, remarkable for their coating of spines, asteri,
sea-stars, pantacrinæ, comatules, astérophons, echini, holothuri, etc.,
represented individually a complete collection of this group.
A somewhat nervous conchyliologist would certainly have fainted before
other more numerous cases, in which were classified the specimens of
molluscs. It was a collection of inestimable value, which time fails me
to describe minutely. Amongst these specimens I will quote from memory
only the elegant royal hammer-fish of the Indian Ocean, whose regular
white spots stood out brightly on a red and brown ground, an imperial
spondyle, bright-coloured, bristling with spines, a rare specimen in