Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea
back to the sheets of the lantern. I cannot describe the effect of the
voltaic rays upon the great blocks so capriciously cut; upon every
angle, every ridge, every facet was thrown a different light, according
to the nature of the veins running through the ice; a dazzling mine of
gems, particularly of sapphires, their blue rays crossing with the
green of the emerald. Here and there were opal shades of wonderful
softness, running through bright spots like diamonds of fire, the
brilliancy of which the eye could not bear. The power of the lantern
seemed increased a hundredfold, like a lamp through the lenticular
plates of a first-class lighthouse.
“How beautiful! how beautiful!” cried Conseil.
“Yes,” I said, “it is a wonderful sight. Is it not, Ned?”
“Yes, confound it! Yes,” answered Ned Land, “it is superb! I am mad at
being obliged to admit it. No one has ever seen anything like it; but
the sight may cost us dear. And, if I must say all, I think we are
seeing here things which God never intended man to see.”
Ned was right, it was too beautiful. Suddenly a cry from Conseil made
me turn.
“What is it?” I asked.
“Shut your eyes, sir! Do not look, sir!” Saying which, Conseil clapped
his hands over his eyes.
“But what is the matter, my boy?”
“I am dazzled, blinded.”
My eyes turned involuntarily towards the glass, but I could not stand
the fire which seemed to devour them. I understood what had happened.
The _Nautilus_ had put on full speed. All the quiet lustre of the
ice-walls was at once changed into flashes of lightning. The fire from
these myriads of diamonds was blinding. It required some time to calm
our troubled looks. At last the hands were taken down.
“Faith, I should never have believed it,” said Conseil.
It was then five in the morning; and at that moment a shock was felt at
the bows of the _Nautilus_. I knew that its spur had struck a block of
ice. It must have been a false manœuvre, for this submarine tunnel,
obstructed by blocks, was not very easy navigation. I thought that
Captain Nemo, by changing his course, would either turn these obstacles
or else follow the windings of the tunnel. In any case, the road before
us could not be entirely blocked. But, contrary to my expectations, the
_Nautilus_ took a decided retrograde motion.
“We are going backwards?” said Conseil.
“Yes,” I replied. “This end of the tunnel can have no egress.”
“And then?”
“Then,” said I, “the working is easy. We must go back again, and go out
at the southern opening. That is all.”
In speaking thus, I wished to appear more confident than I really was.
But the retrograde motion of the _Nautilus_ was increasing; and,
reversing the screw, it carried us at great speed.
“It will be a hindrance,” said Ned.
“What does it matter, some hours more or less, provided we get out at
last?”
“Yes,” repeated Ned Land, “provided we do get out at last!”
For a short time I walked from the saloon to the library. My companions
were silent. I soon threw myself on an ottoman, and took a book, which
my eyes overran mechanically. A quarter of an hour after, Conseil,
approaching me, said, “Is what you are reading very interesting, sir?”
“Very interesting!” I replied.
“I should think so, sir. It is your own book you are reading.”
“My book?”
And indeed I was holding in my hand the work on the Great Submarine
Depths. I did not even dream of it. I closed the book and returned to
my walk. Ned and Conseil rose to go.
“Stay here, my friends,” said I, detaining them. “Let us remain
together until we are out of this block.”
“As you please, sir,” Conseil replied.
Some hours passed. I often looked at the instruments hanging from the
partition. The manometer showed that the _Nautilus_ kept at a constant
depth of more than three hundred yards; the compass still pointed to
south; the log indicated a speed of twenty miles an hour, which, in
such a cramped space, was very great. But Captain Nemo knew that he
could not hasten too much, and that minutes were worth ages to us. At
twenty-five minutes past eight a second shock took place, this time
from behind. I turned pale. My companions were close by my side. I
seized Conseil’s hand. Our looks expressed our feelings better than
words. At this moment the Captain entered the saloon. I went up to him.
“Our course is barred southward?” I asked.
“Yes, sir. The iceberg has shifted and closed every outlet.”
“We are blocked up then?”
“Yes.”
CHAPTER XVI
WANT OF AIR
Thus around the _Nautilus_, above and below, was an impenetrable wall
of ice. We were prisoners to the iceberg. I watched the Captain. His
countenance had resumed its habitual imperturbability.
“Gentlemen,” he said calmly, “there are two ways of dying in the
circumstances in which we are placed.” (This puzzling person had the
air of a mathematical professor lecturing to his pupils.) “The first is
to be crushed; the second is to die of suffocation. I do not speak of
the possibility of dying of hunger, for the supply of provisions in the
_Nautilus_ will certainly last longer than we shall. Let us, then,
calculate our chances.”
“As to suffocation, Captain,” I replied, “that is not to be feared,
because our reservoirs are full.”
“Just so; but they will only yield two days’ supply of air. Now, for
thirty-six hours we have been hidden under the water, and already the
heavy atmosphere of the _Nautilus_ requires renewal. In forty-eight
hours our reserve will be exhausted.”
“Well, Captain, can we be delivered before forty-eight hours?”
“We will attempt it, at least, by piercing the wall that surrounds us.”
“On which side?”
“Sound will tell us. I am going to run the _Nautilus_ aground on the
lower bank, and my men will attack the iceberg on the side that is
least thick.”
Captain Nemo went out. Soon I discovered by a hissing noise that the
water was entering the reservoirs. The _Nautilus_ sank slowly, and
rested on the ice at a depth of 350 yards, the depth at which the lower
bank was immersed.
“My friends,” I said, “our situation is serious, but I rely on your
courage and energy.”
“Sir,” replied the Canadian, “I am ready to do anything for the general
safety.”
“Good! Ned,” and I held out my hand to the Canadian.
“I will add,” he continued, “that, being as handy with the pickaxe as
with the harpoon, if I can be useful to the Captain, he can command my
services.”
“He will not refuse your help. Come, Ned!”
I led him to the room where the crew of the _Nautilus_ were putting on
their cork-jackets. I told the Captain of Ned’s proposal, which he
accepted. The Canadian put on his sea-costume, and was ready as soon as
his companions. When Ned was dressed, I re-entered the drawing-room,
where the panes of glass were open, and, posted near Conseil, I
examined the ambient beds that supported the _Nautilus_. Some instants
after, we saw a dozen of the crew set foot on the bank of ice, and
among them Ned Land, easily known by his stature. Captain Nemo was with
them. Before proceeding to dig the walls, he took the soundings, to be
sure of working in the right direction. Long sounding lines were sunk
in the side walls, but after fifteen yards they were again stopped by
the thick wall. It was useless to attack it on the ceiling-like
surface, since the iceberg itself measured more than 400 yards in
height. Captain Nemo then sounded the lower surface. There ten yards of
wall separated us from the water, so great was the thickness of the
ice-field. It was necessary, therefore, to cut from it a piece equal in
extent to the waterline of the _Nautilus_. There were about 6,000 cubic
yards to detach, so as to dig a hole by which we could descend to the
ice-field. The work had begun immediately and carried on with
indefatigable energy. Instead of digging round the _Nautilus_ which
would have involved greater difficulty, Captain Nemo had an immense
trench made at eight yards from the port-quarter. Then the men set to
work simultaneously with their screws on several points of its
circumference. Presently the pickaxe attacked this compact matter
vigorously, and large blocks were detached from the mass. By a curious
effect of specific gravity, these blocks, lighter than water, fled, so
to speak, to the vault of the tunnel, that increased in thickness at
the top in proportion as it diminished at the base. But that mattered
little, so long as the lower part grew thinner. After two hours’ hard
work, Ned Land came in exhausted. He and his comrades were replaced by
new workers, whom Conseil and I joined. The second lieutenant of the
_Nautilus_ superintended us. The water seemed singularly cold, but I
soon got warm handling the pickaxe. My movements were free enough,
although they were made under a pressure of thirty atmospheres. When I
re-entered, after working two hours, to take some food and rest, I
found a perceptible difference between the pure fluid with which the
Rouquayrol engine supplied me and the atmosphere of the _Nautilus_,
already charged with carbonic acid. The air had not been renewed for
forty-eight hours, and its vivifying qualities were considerably
enfeebled. However, after a lapse of twelve hours, we had only raised a
block of ice one yard thick, on the marked surface, which was about 600
cubic yards! Reckoning that it took twelve hours to accomplish this
much it would take five nights and four days to bring this enterprise
to a satisfactory conclusion. Five nights and four days! And we have
only air enough for two days in the reservoirs! “Without taking into
account,” said Ned, “that, even if we get out of this infernal prison,
we shall also be imprisoned under the iceberg, shut out from all
possible communication with the atmosphere.” True enough! Who could
then foresee the minimum of time necessary for our deliverance? We
might be suffocated before the _Nautilus_ could regain the surface of
the waves? Was it destined to perish in this ice-tomb, with all those
it enclosed? The situation was terrible. But everyone had looked the
danger in the face, and each was determined to do his duty to the last.
As I expected, during the night a new block a yard square was carried
away, and still further sank the immense hollow. But in the morning
when, dressed in my cork-jacket, I traversed the slushy mass at a
temperature of six or seven degrees below zero, I remarked that the
side walls were gradually closing in. The beds of water farthest from
the trench, that were not warmed by the men’s work, showed a tendency
to solidification. In presence of this new and imminent danger, what
would become of our chances of safety, and how hinder the
solidification of this liquid medium, that would burst the partitions
of the _Nautilus_ like glass?
I did not tell my companions of this new danger. What was the good of
damping the energy they displayed in the painful work of escape? But
when I went on board again, I told Captain Nemo of this grave
complication.
“I know it,” he said, in that calm tone which could counteract the most
terrible apprehensions. “It is one danger more; but I see no way of
escaping it; the only chance of safety is to go quicker than
solidification. We must be beforehand with it, that is all.”
On this day for several hours I used my pickaxe vigorously. The work
kept me up. Besides, to work was to quit the _Nautilus_, and breathe
directly the pure air drawn from the reservoirs, and supplied by our
apparatus, and to quit the impoverished and vitiated atmosphere.
Towards evening the trench was dug one yard deeper. When I returned on
board, I was nearly suffocated by the carbonic acid with which the air
was filled—ah! if we had only the chemical means to drive away this
deleterious gas. We had plenty of oxygen; all this water contained a