The Arabian Tunnel
:
PART TWO
That same evening, in 21 deg. 30' N. lat., the Nautilus floated on the
surface of the sea, approaching the Arabian coast. I saw Djeddah, the
most important counting-house of Egypt, Syria, Turkey, and India. I
distinguished clearly enough its buildings, the vessels anchored at the
quays, and those whose draught of water obliged them to anchor in the
roads. The sun, rather low on the horizon, struck full on the houses
of the town, bringing out their whiteness. Outside, some wooden
cabins, and some made of reeds, showed the quarter inhabited by the
Bedouins. Soon Djeddah was shut out from view by the shadows of night,
and the Nautilus found herself under water slightly phosphorescent.
The next day, the 10th of February, we sighted several ships running to
windward. The Nautilus returned to its submarine navigation; but at
noon, when her bearings were taken, the sea being deserted, she rose
again to her waterline.
Accompanied by Ned and Conseil, I seated myself on the platform. The
coast on the eastern side looked like a mass faintly printed upon a
damp fog.
We were leaning on the sides of the pinnace, talking of one thing and
another, when Ned Land, stretching out his hand towards a spot on the
sea, said:
"Do you see anything there, sir?"
"No, Ned," I replied; "but I have not your eyes, you know."
"Look well," said Ned, "there, on the starboard beam, about the height
of the lantern! Do you not see a mass which seems to move?"
"Certainly," said I, after close attention; "I see something like a
long black body on the top of the water."
And certainly before long the black object was not more than a mile
from us. It looked like a great sandbank deposited in the open sea.
It was a gigantic dugong!
Ned Land looked eagerly. His eyes shone with covetousness at the sight
of the animal. His hand seemed ready to harpoon it. One would have
thought he was awaiting the moment to throw himself into the sea and
attack it in its element.
At this instant Captain Nemo appeared on the platform. He saw the
dugong, understood the Canadian's attitude, and, addressing him, said:
"If you held a harpoon just now, Master Land, would it not burn your
hand?"
"Just so, sir."
"And you would not be sorry to go back, for one day, to your trade of a
fisherman and to add this cetacean to the list of those you have
already killed?"
"I should not, sir."
"Well, you can try."
"Thank you, sir," said Ned Land, his eyes flaming.
"Only," continued the Captain, "I advise you for your own sake not to
miss the creature."
"Is the dugong dangerous to attack?" I asked, in spite of the
Canadian's shrug of the shoulders.
"Yes," replied the Captain; "sometimes the animal turns upon its
assailants and overturns their boat. But for Master Land this danger
is not to be feared. His eye is prompt, his arm sure."
At this moment seven men of the crew, mute and immovable as ever,
mounted the platform. One carried a harpoon and a line similar to
those employed in catching whales. The pinnace was lifted from the
bridge, pulled from its socket, and let down into the sea. Six oarsmen
took their seats, and the coxswain went to the tiller. Ned, Conseil,
and I went to the back of the boat.
"You are not coming, Captain?" I asked.
"No, sir; but I wish you good sport."
The boat put off, and, lifted by the six rowers, drew rapidly towards
the dugong, which floated about two miles from the Nautilus.
Arrived some cables-length from the cetacean, the speed slackened, and
the oars dipped noiselessly into the quiet waters. Ned Land, harpoon
in hand, stood in the fore part of the boat. The harpoon used for
striking the whale is generally attached to a very long cord which runs
out rapidly as the wounded creature draws it after him. But here the
cord was not more than ten fathoms long, and the extremity was attached
to a small barrel which, by floating, was to show the course the dugong
took under the water.
I stood and carefully watched the Canadian's adversary. This dugong,
which also bears the name of the halicore, closely resembles the
manatee; its oblong body terminated in a lengthened tail, and its
lateral fins in perfect fingers. Its difference from the manatee
consisted in its upper jaw, which was armed with two long and pointed
teeth which formed on each side diverging tusks.
This dugong which Ned Land was preparing to attack was of colossal
dimensions; it was more than seven yards long. It did not move, and
seemed to be sleeping on the waves, which circumstance made it easier
to capture.
The boat approached within six yards of the animal. The oars rested on
the rowlocks. I half rose. Ned Land, his body thrown a little back,
brandished the harpoon in his experienced hand.
Suddenly a hissing noise was heard, and the dugong disappeared. The
harpoon, although thrown with great force; had apparently only struck
the water.
"Curse it!" exclaimed the Canadian furiously; "I have missed it!"
"No," said I; "the creature is wounded--look at the blood; but your
weapon has not stuck in his body."
"My harpoon! my harpoon!" cried Ned Land.
The sailors rowed on, and the coxswain made for the floating barrel.
The harpoon regained, we followed in pursuit of the animal.
The latter came now and then to the surface to breathe. Its wound had
not weakened it, for it shot onwards with great rapidity.
The boat, rowed by strong arms, flew on its track. Several times it
approached within some few yards, and the Canadian was ready to strike,
but the dugong made off with a sudden plunge, and it was impossible to
reach it.
Imagine the passion which excited impatient Ned Land! He hurled at the
unfortunate creature the most energetic expletives in the English
tongue. For my part, I was only vexed to see the dugong escape all our
attacks.
We pursued it without relaxation for an hour, and I began to think it
would prove difficult to capture, when the animal, possessed with the
perverse idea of vengeance of which he had cause to repent, turned upon
the pinnace and assailed us in its turn.
This manoeuvre did not escape the Canadian.
"Look out!" he cried.
The coxswain said some words in his outlandish tongue, doubtless
warning the men to keep on their guard.
The dugong came within twenty feet of the boat, stopped, sniffed the
air briskly with its large nostrils (not pierced at the extremity, but
in the upper part of its muzzle). Then, taking a spring, he threw
himself upon us.
The pinnace could not avoid the shock, and half upset, shipped at least
two tons of water, which had to be emptied; but, thanks to the
coxswain, we caught it sideways, not full front, so we were not quite
overturned. While Ned Land, clinging to the bows, belaboured the
gigantic animal with blows from his harpoon, the creature's teeth were
buried in the gunwale, and it lifted the whole thing out of the water,
as a lion does a roebuck. We were upset over one another, and I know
not how the adventure would have ended, if the Canadian, still enraged
with the beast, had not struck it to the heart.
I heard its teeth grind on the iron plate, and the dugong disappeared,
carrying the harpoon with him. But the barrel soon returned to the
surface, and shortly after the body of the animal, turned on its back.
The boat came up with it, took it in tow, and made straight for the
Nautilus.
It required tackle of enormous strength to hoist the dugong on to the
platform. It weighed 10,000 lb.
The next day, 11th February, the larder of the Nautilus was enriched by
some more delicate game. A flight of sea-swallows rested on the
Nautilus. It was a species of the Sterna nilotica, peculiar to Egypt;
its beak is black, head grey and pointed, the eye surrounded by white
spots, the back, wings, and tail of a greyish colour, the belly and
throat white, and claws red. They also took some dozen of Nile ducks,
a wild bird of high flavour, its throat and upper part of the head
white with black spots.
About five o'clock in the evening we sighted to the north the Cape of
Ras-Mohammed. This cape forms the extremity of Arabia Petraea,
comprised between the Gulf of Suez and the Gulf of Acabah.
The Nautilus penetrated into the Straits of Jubal, which leads to the
Gulf of Suez. I distinctly saw a high mountain, towering between the
two gulfs of Ras-Mohammed. It was Mount Horeb, that Sinai at the top of
which Moses saw God face to face.
At six o'clock the Nautilus, sometimes floating, sometimes immersed,
passed some distance from Tor, situated at the end of the bay, the
waters of which seemed tinted with red, an observation already made by
Captain Nemo. Then night fell in the midst of a heavy silence,
sometimes broken by the cries of the pelican and other night-birds, and
the noise of the waves breaking upon the shore, chafing against the
rocks, or the panting of some far-off steamer beating the waters of the
Gulf with its noisy paddles.
From eight to nine o'clock the Nautilus remained some fathoms under the
water. According to my calculation we must have been very near Suez.
Through the panel of the saloon I saw the bottom of the rocks
brilliantly lit up by our electric lamp. We seemed to be leaving the
Straits behind us more and more.
At a quarter-past nine, the vessel having returned to the surface, I
mounted the platform. Most impatient to pass through Captain Nemo's
tunnel, I could not stay in one place, so came to breathe the fresh
night air.
Soon in the shadow I saw a pale light, half discoloured by the fog,
shining about a mile from us.
"A floating lighthouse!" said someone near me.
I turned, and saw the Captain.
"It is the floating light of Suez," he continued. "It will not be long
before we gain the entrance of the tunnel."
"The entrance cannot be easy?"
"No, sir; for that reason I am accustomed to go into the steersman's
cage and myself direct our course. And now, if you will go down, M.
Aronnax, the Nautilus is going under the waves, and will not return to
the surface until we have passed through the Arabian Tunnel."
Captain Nemo led me towards the central staircase; half way down he
opened a door, traversed the upper deck, and landed in the pilot's
cage, which it may be remembered rose at the extremity of the platform.
It was a cabin measuring six feet square, very much like that occupied
by the pilot on the steamboats of the Mississippi or Hudson. In the
midst worked a wheel, placed vertically, and caught to the tiller-rope,
which ran to the back of the Nautilus. Four light-ports with
lenticular glasses, let in a groove in the partition of the cabin,
allowed the man at the wheel to see in all directions.
This cabin was dark; but soon my eyes accustomed themselves to the
obscurity, and I perceived the pilot, a strong man, with his hands
resting on the spokes of the wheel. Outside, the sea appeared vividly
lit up by the lantern, which shed its rays from the back of the cabin
to the other extremity of the platform.
"Now," said Captain Nemo, "let us try to make our passage."
Electric wires connected the pilot's cage with the machinery room, and
from there the Captain could communicate simultaneously to his Nautilus
the direction and the speed. He pressed a metal knob, and at once the
speed of the screw diminished.
I looked in silence at the high straight wall we were running by at
this moment, the immovable base of a massive sandy coast. We followed
it thus for an hour only some few yards off.
Captain Nemo did not take his eye from the knob, suspended by its two
concentric circles in the cabin. At a simple gesture, the pilot
modified the course of the Nautilus every instant.
I had placed myself at the port-scuttle, and saw some magnificent
substructures of coral, zoophytes, seaweed, and fucus, agitating their
enormous claws, which stretched out from the fissures of the rock.
At a quarter-past ten, the Captain himself took the helm. A large
gallery, black and deep, opened before us. The Nautilus went boldly
into it. A strange roaring was heard round its sides. It was the
waters of the Red Sea, which the incline of the tunnel precipitated
violently towards the Mediterranean. The Nautilus went with the
torrent, rapid as an arrow, in spite of the efforts of the machinery,
which, in order to offer more effective resistance, beat the waves with
reversed screw.
On the walls of the narrow passage I could see nothing but brilliant
rays, straight lines, furrows of fire, traced by the great speed, under
the brilliant electric light. My heart beat fast.
At thirty-five minutes past ten, Captain Nemo quitted the helm, and,
turning to me, said:
"The Mediterranean!"
In less than twenty minutes, the Nautilus, carried along by the
torrent, had passed through the Isthmus of Suez.