Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea
skewer, was roasted before a red fire of dead wood. While these
interesting birds were cooking, Ned prepared the fruit of the
bread-tree. Then the wood-pigeons were devoured to the bones, and
declared excellent. The nutmeg, with which they are in the habit of
stuffing their crops, flavours their flesh and renders it delicious
eating.
“Now, Ned, what do you miss now?”
“Some four-footed game, M. Aronnax. All these pigeons are only
side-dishes and trifles; and until I have killed an animal with cutlets
I shall not be content.”
“Nor I, Ned, if I do not catch a bird of paradise.”
“Let us continue hunting,” replied Conseil. “Let us go towards the sea.
We have arrived at the first declivities of the mountains, and I think
we had better regain the region of forests.”
That was sensible advice, and was followed out. After walking for one
hour we had attained a forest of sago-trees. Some inoffensive serpents
glided away from us. The birds of paradise fled at our approach, and
truly I despaired of getting near one when Conseil, who was walking in
front, suddenly bent down, uttered a triumphal cry, and came back to me
bringing a magnificent specimen.
“Ah! bravo, Conseil!”
“Master is very good.”
“No, my boy; you have made an excellent stroke. Take one of these
living birds, and carry it in your hand.”
“If master will examine it, he will see that I have not deserved great
merit.”
“Why, Conseil?”
“Because this bird is as drunk as a quail.”
“Drunk!”
“Yes, sir; drunk with the nutmegs that it devoured under the
nutmeg-tree, under which I found it. See, friend Ned, see the monstrous
effects of intemperance!”
“By Jove!” exclaimed the Canadian, “because I have drunk gin for two
months, you must needs reproach me!”
However, I examined the curious bird. Conseil was right. The bird,
drunk with the juice, was quite powerless. It could not fly; it could
hardly walk.
This bird belonged to the most beautiful of the eight species that are
found in Papua and in the neighbouring islands. It was the “large
emerald bird, the most rare kind.” It measured three feet in length.
Its head was comparatively small, its eyes placed near the opening of
the beak, and also small. But the shades of colour were beautiful,
having a yellow beak, brown feet and claws, nut-coloured wings with
purple tips, pale yellow at the back of the neck and head, and emerald
colour at the throat, chestnut on the breast and belly. Two horned,
downy nets rose from below the tail, that prolonged the long light
feathers of admirable fineness, and they completed the whole of this
marvellous bird, that the natives have poetically named the “bird of
the sun.”
But if my wishes were satisfied by the possession of the bird of
paradise, the Canadian’s were not yet. Happily, about two o’clock, Ned
Land brought down a magnificent hog; from the brood of those the
natives call “bari-outang.” The animal came in time for us to procure
real quadruped meat, and he was well received. Ned Land was very proud
of his shot. The hog, hit by the electric ball, fell stone dead. The
Canadian skinned and cleaned it properly, after having taken half a
dozen cutlets, destined to furnish us with a grilled repast in the
evening. Then the hunt was resumed, which was still more marked by Ned
and Conseil’s exploits.
Indeed, the two friends, beating the bushes, roused a herd of kangaroos
that fled and bounded along on their elastic paws. But these animals
did not take to flight so rapidly but what the electric capsule could
stop their course.
“Ah, Professor!” cried Ned Land, who was carried away by the delights
of the chase, “what excellent game, and stewed, too! What a supply for
the _Nautilus!_ Two! three! five down! And to think that we shall eat
that flesh, and that the idiots on board shall not have a crumb!”
I think that, in the excess of his joy, the Canadian, if he had not
talked so much, would have killed them all. But he contented himself
with a single dozen of these interesting marsupians. These animals were
small. They were a species of those “kangaroo rabbitss” that live
habitually in the hollows of trees, and whose speed is extreme; but
they are moderately fat, and furnish, at least, estimable food. We were
very satisfied with the results of the hunt. Happy Ned proposed to
return to this enchanting island the next day, for he wished to
depopulate it of all the eatable quadrupeds. But he had reckoned
without his host.
At six o’clock in the evening we had regained the shore; our boat was
moored to the usual place. The _Nautilus_, like a long rock, emerged
from the waves two miles from the beach. Ned Land, without waiting,
occupied himself about the important dinner business. He understood all
about cooking well. The “bari-outang,” grilled on the coals, soon
scented the air with a delicious odour.
Indeed, the dinner was excellent. Two wood-pigeons completed this
extraordinary menu. The sago pasty, the artocarpus bread, some mangoes,
half a dozen pineapples, and the liquor fermented from some coco-nuts,
overjoyed us. I even think that my worthy companions’ ideas had not all
the plainness desirable.
“Suppose we do not return to the _Nautilus_ this evening?” said
Conseil.
“Suppose we never return?” added Ned Land.
Just then a stone fell at our feet and cut short the harpooner’s
proposition.
CHAPTER XXI
CAPTAIN NEMO’S THUNDERBOLT
We looked at the edge of the forest without rising, my hand stopping in
the action of putting it to my mouth, Ned Land’s completing its office.
“Stones do not fall from the sky,” remarked Conseil, “or they would
merit the name aerolites.”
A second stone, carefully aimed, that made a savoury pigeon’s leg fall
from Conseil’s hand, gave still more weight to his observation. We all
three arose, shouldered our guns, and were ready to reply to any
attack.
“Are they apes?” cried Ned Land.
“Very nearly—they are savages.”
“To the boat!” I said, hurrying to the sea.
It was indeed necessary to beat a retreat, for about twenty natives
armed with bows and slings appeared on the skirts of a copse that
masked the horizon to the right, hardly a hundred steps from us.
Our boat was moored about sixty feet from us. The savages approached
us, not running, but making hostile demonstrations. Stones and arrows
fell thickly.
Ned Land had not wished to leave his provisions; and, in spite of his
imminent danger, his pig on one side and kangaroos on the other, he
went tolerably fast. In two minutes we were on the shore. To load the
boat with provisions and arms, to push it out to sea, and ship the
oars, was the work of an instant. We had not gone two cable-lengths,
when a hundred savages, howling and gesticulating, entered the water up
to their waists. I watched to see if their apparition would attract
some men from the _Nautilus_ on to the platform. But no. The enormous
machine, lying off, was absolutely deserted.
Twenty minutes later we were on board. The panels were open. After
making the boat fast, we entered into the interior of the _Nautilus_.
I descended to the drawing-room, from whence I heard some chords.
Captain Nemo was there, bending over his organ, and plunged in a
musical ecstasy.
“Captain!”
He did not hear me.
“Captain!” I said, touching his hand.
He shuddered, and, turning round, said, “Ah! it is you, Professor?
Well, have you had a good hunt, have you botanised successfully?”
“Yes Captain; but we have unfortunately brought a troop of bipeds,
whose vicinity troubles me.”
“What bipeds?”
“Savages.”
“Savages!” he echoed, ironically. “So you are astonished, Professor, at
having set foot on a strange land and finding savages? Savages! where
are there not any? Besides, are they worse than others, these whom you
call savages?”
“But Captain——”
“How many have you counted?”
“A hundred at least.”
“M. Aronnax,” replied Captain Nemo, placing his fingers on the organ
stops, “when all the natives of Papua are assembled on this shore, the
_Nautilus_ will have nothing to fear from their attacks.”
The Captain’s fingers were then running over the keys of the
instrument, and I remarked that he touched only the black keys, which
gave his melodies an essentially Scotch character. Soon he had
forgotten my presence, and had plunged into a reverie that I did not
disturb. I went up again on to the platform: night had already fallen;
for, in this low latitude, the sun sets rapidly and without twilight. I
could only see the island indistinctly; but the numerous fires, lighted
on the beach, showed that the natives did not think of leaving it. I
was alone for several hours, sometimes thinking of the natives—but
without any dread of them, for the imperturbable confidence of the
Captain was catching—sometimes forgetting them to admire the splendours
of the night in the tropics. My remembrances went to France in the
train of those zodiacal stars that would shine in some hours’ time. The
moon shone in the midst of the constellations of the zenith.
The night slipped away without any mischance, the islanders frightened
no doubt at the sight of a monster aground in the bay. The panels were
open, and would have offered an easy access to the interior of the
_Nautilus_.
At six o’clock in the morning of the 8th January I went up on to the
platform. The dawn was breaking. The island soon showed itself through
the dissipating fogs, first the shore, then the summits.
The natives were there, more numerous than on the day before—five or
six hundred perhaps—some of them, profiting by the low water, had come
on to the coral, at less than two cable-lengths from the _Nautilus_. I
distinguished them easily; they were true Papuans, with athletic
figures, men of good race, large high foreheads, large, but not broad
and flat, and white teeth. Their woolly hair, with a reddish tinge,
showed off on their black shining bodies like those of the Nubians.
From the lobes of their ears, cut and distended, hung chaplets of
bones. Most of these savages were naked. Amongst them, I remarked some
women, dressed from the hips to knees in quite a crinoline of herbs,
that sustained a vegetable waistband. Some chiefs had ornamented their
necks with a crescent and collars of glass beads, red and white; nearly
all were armed with bows, arrows, and shields and carried on their
shoulders a sort of net containing those round stones which they cast
from their slings with great skill. One of these chiefs, rather near to
the _Nautilus_, examined it attentively. He was, perhaps, a “mado” of
high rank, for he was draped in a mat of banana-leaves, notched round
the edges, and set off with brilliant colours.
I could easily have knocked down this native, who was within a short
length; but I thought that it was better to wait for real hostile
demonstrations. Between Europeans and savages, it is proper for the
Europeans to parry sharply, not to attack.
During low water the natives roamed about near the _Nautilus_, but were
not troublesome; I heard them frequently repeat the word “Assai,” and
by their gestures I understood that they invited me to go on land, an
invitation that I declined.
So that, on that day, the boat did not push off, to the great
displeasure of Master Land, who could not complete his provisions.
This adroit Canadian employed his time in preparing the viands and meat
that he had brought off the island. As for the savages, they returned
to the shore about eleven o’clock in the morning, as soon as the coral
tops began to disappear under the rising tide; but I saw their numbers
had increased considerably on the shore. Probably they came from the
neighbouring islands, or very likely from Papua. However, I had not
seen a single native canoe. Having nothing better to do, I thought of