by Jules Verne
During this part of the voyage, we sailed for entire days on the surface.
The ocean was virtually empty — just a few sailing ships, with cargo for the Indies, heading for the Cape of Good Hope. One day we were pursued by boats from a whaling ship which undoubtedly took us for an enormous whale of great value. But Captain Nemo did not wish to have these good men waste their time and effort, so he ended the chase by diving underwater. This incident seemed to greatly interest Ned Land. I believe I am quite right to say that the Canadian was sorry our cetacean could not be killed by the fishermen’s harpoons.
The fish observed by Conseil and myself during this period differed little from those we had studied at other latitudes. They were mainly specimens from that terrible genus of cartilaginous fish, divided into three sub-genera and no less than thirty-two species: five-metre gallooned sharks, with squashed heads that are wider than their bodies, curved tail-fins, and backs bearing seven large black lengthwise stripes; and seven-gill sharks, cinder-grey with seven branchial openings and a single dorsal fin at approximately the middle of the body.
Large dogfish also passed, voracious fish if ever there were any. One cannot lend credence to fishermen’s tales, but this is what they say. In one has been found a buffalo head and an entire calf; in another, two tuna fish and a uniformed sailor; in another, a soldier with his sword; and in a fourth, a horse and its rider.* All this, to be frank, is not necessarily gospel truth. But as not one of these animals allowed itself to be caught in the Nautilus’s nets, I was not able to check exactly how voracious they are.
Elegant and playful schools of dolphins accompanied us for entire days. They went around in groups of five or six, hunting in packs like wolves in the countryside. They are no less voracious than the dogfish, so that I can believe a certain gentleman from Copenhagen,* who claims to have taken thirteen porpoises and fifteen seals from the stomach of one dolphin. It was, admittedly, an orca, belonging to the biggest known species, that sometimes exceed 24 feet. This family of Delphinidae includes ten genera, and those that I saw belonged to the genus of Delphinorhynchi, remarkable for their extremely narrow snouts, four times as long as their heads. Their bodies, three metres long and black on top, were coloured pinkish-white underneath with very occasional small dots.
I will also cite strange specimens amongst these seas of fish from the order of acanthopterygians and family of sciaenoids. A few authors — more poets than naturalists — have claimed that these fish sing harmoniously, and that their assembled voices form a concert that a choir of human voices could never equal. I am sure this is true, but to my regret, these sciaenas did not serenade us as we passed.
And finally, Conseil classified a great number of flying fish. Nothing was more engrossing than to watch the dolphins hunting them with ingenious skill. Whatever the range of their flight, whatever trajectory they described, even jumping right over the Nautilus, the unfortunate fish always found the mouth of a dolphin open to receive them. They were either pirapeda or red gurnards, and during the night their luminous mouths traced fiery tracks through the air that plunged into the dark waters like shooting stars.
Until 13 March, we continued on our course without change. That day, the Nautilus engaged in an experiment with soundings that interested me tremendously.
We had then covered 13,000 leagues since our starting-point in the open seas of the Pacific. Our position had been taken as 45° 37´ S, 37° 53´ W. These were the same waters where Captain Denham of the Herald* had dropped 14,000 metres of sound without finding the bottom. There also, Lieutenant Parker of the American frigate Congress* was unable to reach the submarine floor at 15,140 metres.
Captain Nemo resolved to take the Nautilus to the greatest possible depth in order to investigate the different soundings. I got ready to note all the results of the experiment. The panels of the salon were opened and operations began for reaching those prodigious deeps.
It can easily be seen that diving by merely filling the tanks was out of the question. They would not have been able to increase the specific weight of the Nautilus sufficiently. But in any case, to have come up again, it would have been necessary to expel this water, and the pumps would not have been powerful enough to overcome the external pressure at those great depths.
Captain Nemo decided to head for the ocean floor by following a sufficiently oblique path, using his lateral planes placed at an angle of 45° to the Nautilus’s waterline. The propeller was also set at maximum speed, and its four blades soon began to thrash the water with indescribable violence.
Under this powerful impulse, the hull of the Nautilus trembled like a vibrating cord as it cut steadily into the waters. The captain and I, at our station in the salon, followed the swiftly descending needle of the pressure-gauge. Soon the inhabitable zone where most fish live had been left behind. Whilst there are some fish which can only live on the surface of the seas or rivers, there are a few which can survive at quite great depths. Amongst them, I observed the hexanchus, a sort of dogfish equipped with six respiratory slits, the telescope-fish with enormous eyes, the armoured gurnard with grey thoracic and black pectoral fins, with its plastron protected by light red bony plates, and finally a sort of grenadier, living at 1,200 metres and supporting a pressure of 120 atmospheres.
I asked Captain Nemo if he had observed fish at still greater depths.
‘Fish?’ he replied. ‘Rarely. But do tell me: in the present state of science, what has been deduced, what do people really know?’
‘The following, captain. It is known that when going towards the greatest depths of the ocean, vegetable life disappears more quickly than animal life. It is known that at points where animate life-forms are still encountered, there no longer lives a single hydrophyte. It is known that scallops and oysters live 2,000 metres down, and that McClintock, the hero of the polar seas,* drew a living starfish from a depth of 2,500 metres. It is known that the crew of the Royal Navy’s Bull-Dog fished an asteria at 2,620 fathoms, or more than a league down. So, Captain Nemo, how can you tell me that nothing is known?’
‘I cannot, monsieur,’ he replied, ‘I would not be so impolite. However, I would like to ask how you explain that these creatures can live at such depths?’
‘I can give two explanations. First of all, the vertical currents caused by the differences in salt concentration and density of the water produce a movement which suffices to maintain a rudimentary life of crinoids and asterias.’
‘Absolutely,’ said the captain.
‘And secondly, if oxygen is the basis of life, it is known that the quantity of oxygen dissolved in sea water actually increases with depth, since the pressure of the lowest depths helps to compress it.’
‘Ah, that is known?’ replied Captain Nemo, in a slightly surprised tone. ‘Well, monsieur, people are quite right to assume that, because it is the truth. I would add that the swimming bladders of fish contain more nitrogen than oxygen when they are caught on the surface, but more oxygen than nitrogen when they are drawn from the great depths; which confirms your system. But let us continue our observations.’
My eyes turned to the pressure-gauge. It indicated a depth of 6,000 metres. We had been diving for an hour. The Nautilus, thanks to its inclined planes, was still descending. The deserted waters were beautifully transparent, of an indescribable clarity. An hour later, we were at 13,000 metres — approximately 3½ leagues — and the bottom of the ocean was still nowhere in sight.
However, at 14,000 metres I noticed some dark peaks emerging from the waters, but these summits could belong to mountains as high as Mont Blanc or the Himalayas, higher even, for the depth of the chasms remained impossible to estimate.
The Nautilus descended lower still, in spite of the tremendous pressure it was undergoing. I could feel the plates trembling where their bolts were fixed; bars were bending; bulkheads were groaning; the windows in the salon seemed to be bending under the pressure of the water. And this robust machine would undoubted
ly have given way if, as its captain had said, it had not been able to resist like a solid block.
Skimming over the slopes of these rocks lost under the waters, I noticed a few remaining shells, together with some serpula and living spirorbises, plus a few starfish.
But soon these last representatives of animal life had disappeared and below three leagues* the Nautilus left behind the limits of submarine life, just as a balloon rises in the air above aerial zones where breathing is possible. We reached a depth of 16,000 metres — four leagues — and the sides of the Nautilus were at this moment supporting a pressure of 1,600 atmospheres, that is 1,600 kilograms for every square centimetre of its surface!
‘It’s incredible!’ I cried. ‘To roam these deep regions where man has never ventured! Look, captain, look at the magnificent rocks, the uninhabited grottoes, the last areas of the globe where life is no longer possible! Can it be that all we will have to take back up with us are the memories of these yet-unseen sights?’
‘Would it please you’, Captain Nemo asked, ‘to take back more than memories?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean that nothing would be easier than to make a photographic record of this submarine region!’
I had not had time to express my surprise at this new suggestion, when, following a sign from Captain Nemo, a camera was brought into the salon. The electrically illuminated liquid element distributed a perfectly even light through the wide-open panels. No shadow, no distortion from this artificial light. The sun could not have been more suited to tasks of this kind. The Nautilus was kept motionless by the thrust of its propeller working against its angled planes. The camera was aimed at the scene on the ocean floor, and within a few seconds we had obtained a very clear negative.
I attach the photographic print. One can see: primordial rocks which have never known the light of day; the inferior granites which form the powerful bedrock of the globe; deep grottoes hollowed out in the rocky masses; profiles of an incomparable clarity whose extremities are picked out in black, as if by certain Flemish artists; then, beyond, a horizon of mountains, a superb undulating line which forms the background to the scene. I simply cannot describe this collection of resplendent rocks: polished black, without moss, without marks, in oddly cloven shapes, firmly anchored on the carpet of sand, sparkling in the beams of electric light.
Once Captain Nemo had finished the operation, he said to me:
‘Let’s go back up again, monsieur. We must not abuse this situation or expose the Nautilus to such pressures for too long.’
‘Let’s go up then,’ I replied.
‘Please hold on.’
Before I had had time to understand why the captain had given me this advice, I was thrown on to the carpet.
With its propeller engaged on a signal from the captain and its planes now at the vertical, the Nautilus, carried like a balloon into the air, rose at a staggering speed. It raced through the waters. All details were blurred. In four minutes it covered the 4 leagues to the surface, emerged noisily like a flying fish, and fell back again, sending a wash soaring to a prodigious height.
12
Baleen and Sperm Whales*
During the night of 13 to 14 March, the Nautilus continued on its route southwards. I thought that once at Cape Horn it would set sail for the west, in order to head for the seas of the Pacific and thus complete its journey around the world. It did nothing of the sort, and continued to head down towards the southern polar regions. Where did the Nautilus mean to go? To the Pole? That was crazy. I began to believe that Ned was right to fear the captain’s recklessness.
The Canadian had not spoken to me for a long time about his plans to escape. He had become noticeably less communicative, almost silent. I could see how the long imprisonment was weighing down on him. I could feel how much anger was building up inside him. When he met the captain, his eyes would light up with a dark fire, and I always feared that his violent nature would lead to some extreme action.
That day, 14 March, he came with Conseil to find me in my room. I asked them the reason for their visit.
‘A simple question to ask you, monsieur,’ the Canadian said.
‘Speak, Ned.’
‘How many men do you think there are on board the Nautilus?’
‘I cannot say, my friend.’
‘It seems to me’, he continued, ‘that it would not require a very large crew to run the Nautilus.’
‘Just so, at present, ten men at most would be enough to operate things.’
‘Exactly, why would there be more?’
‘Why?’ I repeated.
I stared at Land, whose plans were easy to guess.
‘Because’, I continued, ‘if I follow my hunch and if I have properly understood the captain’s life, the Nautilus is not only a ship, it must also be a place of refuge for those, like its captain, who have broken all ties with the land.’
‘Perhaps,’ said Conseil. ‘But the Nautilus can only contain a finite number of men, and could monsieur not estimate what the maximum might be?’
‘How could I do that, Conseil?’
‘Through calculation. Given that monsieur knows the capacity of the ship, and consequently the quantity of air it contains; knowing also how much each man consumes in breathing; comparing these figures with the Nautilus’s need to surface every twenty-four hours . . .’
Conseil’s sentence did not seem to have an end, but I could see what he was getting at.
‘I understand, but though that calculation is easy to make, I can only reach a very approximate figure.’
‘It doesn’t matter,’ said Ned insistently.
‘Here are the figures, then,’ I replied. ‘In an hour each man exhausts the oxygen in 100 litres of air, or in twenty-four hours the oxygen in 2,400 litres. We need, therefore, to find out how many times 2,400 litres goes into the air in the Nautilus.’
‘Precisely,’ said Conseil.
‘Now’, I continued, ‘since the capacity of the Nautilus is 1,500 tons, and a ton is 1,000 litres, the Nautilus contains 1.5 million litres of air, which, divided by 2,400 . . .’
I quickly wrote down some calculations.
‘. . . gives 625, which means that the air in the Nautilus could easily be sufficient for 625 men for twenty-four hours.’
‘Six hundred and twenty-five!’ exclaimed Ned.
‘But take it from me that including passengers and sailors, as well as officers, we do not make up a tenth of that figure.’
‘Still too many for three men!’ murmured Conseil.
‘So, my poor Ned, I can only advise patience.’
‘More than patience,’ replied Conseil; ‘resignation.’
Conseil had indeed picked the appropriate term.
‘But on the other hand,’ he said, ‘Captain Nemo cannot head south for ever. He will have to stop at some point, even if it’s only at the ice-cap! He will then have to head towards more civilized seas! Then will be the time to execute Ned Land’s plans.’
The Canadian shook his head, wiped his forehead with the back of his hand, and went out without another word.
‘If I may be allowed to make an observation,’ said Conseil, ‘poor Ned is thinking about all the things he cannot have. Everything casts him back to his former life. Everything appears jaded to him, because everything is restricted. His past memories oppress him, and he is sore at heart. We need to understand. What can he do here? Nothing. He is not a scientist like monsieur, and so is not able to take the same interest as us in the incredible things in the sea all around. He would risk everything to go to a tavern in his home country!’
It seemed clear that the monotony on board was unbearable to the Canadian, accustomed as he was to a free and active life. There were few things he could take any interest in. However, that day something happened to remind him of his glory days as a harpooner.
At about eleven in the morning, being on the surface, the Nautilus fell in with a school of whales. An encounter
which did not surprise me, for I knew that these animals, under outrageous pressure from hunting, have taken refuge in the higher latitudes.
The role played by the whale in the marine world and its influence on geographical discoveries have been considerable. The whale encouraged the Basques to follow it, then lured on the Asturians of north-west Spain, the British, and the Dutch, inured them to the dangers of the ocean, and took them from one end of the earth to the other. Whales like to frequent the Arctic and Antarctic oceans. Ancient legends even claim that these cetaceans led fishermen to a mere seven leagues from the North Pole. If the tale is false now, it will be true one day, for it will probably be while hunting a whale in the Arctic or Antarctic that men will reach those virgin points of the globe.
We were sitting on the platform in a calm sea. The equivalent of October gave us fine autumn days in those latitudes. It was the Canadian — never mistaken — who reported a whale on the eastern horizon. Looking carefully, one could see its blackish back rising and falling above the waves, about 5 miles from the Nautilus.
‘Ah!’ cried Ned Land. ‘If I was on board a whaling ship, here is an encounter that would please me. It’s a huge one. Look how high its blowholes are sending columns of air and vapour! Damn! Why do I have to be chained to this piece of old iron!’
‘What, Ned! Have you not yet got over your old ideas of harpooning?’
‘Can a whaler ever forget his former trade? Can you ever get tired of the feelings of the hunt?’
‘Have you never been whaling in these seas, Ned?’
‘Never, monsieur. Just the Arctic seas, and the Bering Strait as often as the Davis Strait.’
