A Note Of Invitation
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PART ONE
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Twenty Thousand Leagues Under The Sea
The next day was the 9th of November. I awoke after a long sleep of
twelve hours. Conseil came, according to custom, to know "how I passed
the night," and to offer his services. He had left his friend the
Canadian sleeping like a man who had never done anything else all his
life. I let the worthy fellow chatter as he pleased, without caring to
answer him. I was preoccupied by the absence of the Captain during our
itting of the day before, and hoping to see him to-day.
As soon as I was dressed I went into the saloon. It was deserted. I
plunged into the study of the shell treasures hidden behind the glasses.
The whole day passed without my being honoured by a visit from Captain
Nemo. The panels of the saloon did not open. Perhaps they did not
wish us to tire of these beautiful things.
The course of the Nautilus was E.N.E., her speed twelve knots, the
depth below the surface between twenty-five and thirty fathoms.
The next day, 10th of November, the same desertion, the same solitude.
I did not see one of the ship's crew: Ned and Conseil spent the greater
part of the day with me. They were astonished at the puzzling absence
of the Captain. Was this singular man ill?--had he altered his
intentions with regard to us?
After all, as Conseil said, we enjoyed perfect liberty, we were
delicately and abundantly fed. Our host kept to his terms of the
treaty. We could not complain, and, indeed, the singularity of our
fate reserved such wonderful compensation for us that we had no right
to accuse it as yet.
That day I commenced the journal of these adventures which has enabled
me to relate them with more scrupulous exactitude and minute detail.
11th November, early in the morning. The fresh air spreading over the
interior of the Nautilus told me that we had come to the surface of the
ocean to renew our supply of oxygen. I directed my steps to the
central staircase, and mounted the platform.
It was six o'clock, the weather was cloudy, the sea grey, but calm.
Scarcely a billow. Captain Nemo, whom I hoped to meet, would he be
there? I saw no one but the steersman imprisoned in his glass cage.
Seated upon the projection formed by the hull of the pinnace, I inhaled
the salt breeze with delight.
By degrees the fog disappeared under the action of the sun's rays, the
radiant orb rose from behind the eastern horizon. The sea flamed under
its glance like a train of gunpowder. The clouds scattered in the
heights were coloured with lively tints of beautiful shades, and
numerous "mare's tails," which betokened wind for that day. But what
was wind to this Nautilus, which tempests could not frighten!
I was admiring this joyous rising of the sun, so gay, and so
life-giving, when I heard steps approaching the platform. I was
prepared to salute Captain Nemo, but it was his second (whom I had
already seen on the Captain's first visit) who appeared. He advanced
on the platform, not seeming to see me. With his powerful glass to his
eye, he scanned every point of the horizon with great attention. This
examination over, he approached the panel and pronounced a sentence in
exactly these terms. I have remembered it, for every morning it was
repeated under exactly the same conditions. It was thus worded:
"Nautron respoc lorni virch."
What it meant I could not say.
These words pronounced, the second descended. I thought that the
Nautilus was about to return to its submarine navigation. I regained
the panel and returned to my chamber.
Five days sped thus, without any change in our situation. Every
morning I mounted the platform. The same phrase was pronounced by the
same individual. But Captain Nemo did not appear.
I had made up my mind that I should never see him again, when, on the
16th November, on returning to my room with Ned and Conseil, I found
upon my table a note addressed to me. I opened it impatiently. It was
written in a bold, clear hand, the characters rather pointed, recalling
the German type. The note was worded as follows:
TO PROFESSOR ARONNAX, On board the Nautilus. 16th of November, 1867.
Captain Nemo invites Professor Aronnax to a hunting-party, which will
take place to-morrow morning in the forests of the Island of Crespo.
He hopes that nothing will prevent the Professor from being present,
and he will with pleasure see him joined by his companions.
CAPTAIN NEMO, Commander of the Nautilus.
"A hunt!" exclaimed Ned.
"And in the forests of the Island of Crespo!" added Conseil.
"Oh! then the gentleman is going on terra firma?" replied Ned Land.
"That seems to me to be clearly indicated," said I, reading the letter
once more.
"Well, we must accept," said the Canadian. "But once more on dry
ground, we shall know what to do. Indeed, I shall not be sorry to eat
a piece of fresh venison."
Without seeking to reconcile what was contradictory between Captain
Nemo's manifest aversion to islands and continents, and his invitation
to hunt in a forest, I contented myself with replying:
"Let us first see where the Island of Crespo is."
I consulted the planisphere, and in 32 deg. 40' N. lat. and 157 deg.
50' W. long., I found a small island, recognised in 1801 by Captain
Crespo, and marked in the ancient Spanish maps as Rocca de la Plata,
the meaning of which is The Silver Rock. We were then about eighteen
hundred miles from our starting-point, and the course of the Nautilus,
a little changed, was bringing it back towards the southeast.
I showed this little rock, lost in the midst of the North Pacific, to
my companions.
"If Captain Nemo does sometimes go on dry ground," said I, "he at least
chooses desert islands."
Ned Land shrugged his shoulders without speaking, and Conseil and he
left me.
After supper, which was served by the steward, mute and impassive, I
went to bed, not without some anxiety.
The next morning, the 17th of November, on awakening, I felt that the
Nautilus was perfectly still. I dressed quickly and entered the saloon.
Captain Nemo was there, waiting for me. He rose, bowed, and asked me
if it was convenient for me to accompany him. As he made no allusion
to his absence during the last eight days, I did not mention it, and
simply answered that my companions and myself were ready to follow him.
We entered the dining-room, where breakfast was served.
"M. Aronnax," said the Captain, "pray, share my breakfast without
ceremony; we will chat as we eat. For, though I promised you a walk in
the forest, I did not undertake to find hotels there. So breakfast as
a man who will most likely not have his dinner till very late."
I did honour to the repast. It was composed of several kinds of fish,
and slices of sea-cucumber, and different sorts of seaweed. Our drink
consisted of pure water, to which the Captain added some drops of a
fermented liquor, extracted by the Kamschatcha method from a seaweed
known under the name of Rhodomenia palmata. Captain Nemo ate at first
without saying a word. Then he began:
"Sir, when I proposed to you to hunt in my submarine forest of Crespo,
you evidently thought me mad. Sir, you should never judge lightly of
any man."
"But Captain, believe me----"
"Be kind enough to listen, and you will then see whether you have any
cause to accuse me of folly and contradiction."
"I listen."
"You know as well as I do, Professor, that man can live under water,
providing he carries with him a sufficient supply of breathable air.
In submarine works, the workman, clad in an impervious dress, with his
head in a metal helmet, receives air from above by means of forcing
pumps and regulators."
"That is a diving apparatus," said I.
"Just so, but under these conditions the man is not at liberty; he is
attached to the pump which sends him air through an india-rubber tube,
and if we were obliged to be thus held to the Nautilus, we could not go
far."
"And the means of getting free?" I asked.
"It is to use the Rouquayrol apparatus, invented by two of your own
countrymen, which I have brought to perfection for my own use, and
which will allow you to risk yourself under these new physiological
conditions without any organ whatever suffering. It consists of a
reservoir of thick iron plates, in which I store the air under a
pressure of fifty atmospheres. This reservoir is fixed on the back by
means of braces, like a soldier's knapsack. Its upper part forms a box
in which the air is kept by means of a bellows, and therefore cannot
escape unless at its normal tension. In the Rouquayrol apparatus such
as we use, two india rubber pipes leave this box and join a sort of
tent which holds the nose and mouth; one is to introduce fresh air, the
other to let out the foul, and the tongue closes one or the other
according to the wants of the respirator. But I, in encountering great
pressures at the bottom of the sea, was obliged to shut my head, like
that of a diver in a ball of copper; and it is to this ball of copper
that the two pipes, the inspirator and the expirator, open."
"Perfectly, Captain Nemo; but the air that you carry with you must soon
be used; when it only contains fifteen per cent. of oxygen it is no
longer fit to breathe."
"Right! But I told you, M. Aronnax, that the pumps of the Nautilus
allow me to store the air under considerable pressure, and on those
conditions the reservoir of the apparatus can furnish breathable air
for nine or ten hours."
"I have no further objections to make," I answered. "I will only ask
you one thing, Captain--how can you light your road at the bottom of
the sea?"
"With the Ruhmkorff apparatus, M. Aronnax; one is carried on the back,
the other is fastened to the waist. It is composed of a Bunsen pile,
which I do not work with bichromate of potash, but with sodium. A wire
is introduced which collects the electricity produced, and directs it
towards a particularly made lantern. In this lantern is a spiral glass
which contains a small quantity of carbonic gas. When the apparatus is
at work this gas becomes luminous, giving out a white and continuous
light. Thus provided, I can breathe and I can see."
"Captain Nemo, to all my objections you make such crushing answers that
I dare no longer doubt. But, if I am forced to admit the Rouquayrol
and Ruhmkorff apparatus, I must be allowed some reservations with
regard to the gun I am to carry."
"But it is not a gun for powder," answered the Captain.
"Then it is an air-gun."
"Doubtless! How would you have me manufacture gun powder on board,
without either saltpetre, sulphur, or charcoal?"
"Besides," I added, "to fire under water in a medium eight hundred and
fifty-five times denser than the air, we must conquer very considerable
resistance."
"That would be no difficulty. There exist guns, according to Fulton,
perfected in England by Philip Coles and Burley, in France by Furcy,
and in Italy by Landi, which are furnished with a peculiar system of
closing, which can fire under these conditions. But I repeat, having
no powder, I use air under great pressure, which the pumps of the
Nautilus furnish abundantly."
"But this air must be rapidly used?"
"Well, have I not my Rouquayrol reservoir, which can furnish it at
need? A tap is all that is required. Besides M. Aronnax, you must see
yourself that, during our submarine hunt, we can spend but little air
and but few balls."
"But it seems to me that in this twilight, and in the midst of this
fluid, which is very dense compared with the atmosphere, shots could
not go far, nor easily prove mortal."
"Sir, on the contrary, with this gun every blow is mortal; and, however
lightly the animal is touched, it falls as if struck by a thunderbolt."
"Why?"
"Because the balls sent by this gun are not ordinary balls, but little
cases of glass. These glass cases are covered with a case of steel,
and weighted with a pellet of lead; they are real Leyden bottles, into
which the electricity is forced to a very high tension. With the
slightest shock they are discharged, and the animal, however strong it
may be, falls dead. I must tell you that these cases are size number
four, and that the charge for an ordinary gun would be ten."
"I will argue no longer," I replied, rising from the table. "I have
nothing left me but to take my gun. At all events, I will go where you
go."
Captain Nemo then led me aft; and in passing before Ned's and Conseil's
cabin, I called my two companions, who followed promptly. We then came
to a cell near the machinery-room, in which we put on our walking-dress.