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34 - A Voyage of Discovery - Journey to the Center of the Earth - Jules Verne · Classic Science Fiction Books

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  Speaker 1: Chapter thirty four, A Voyage of Discovery. It would be
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  Speaker 1: altogether impossible for me to give any idea of the
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  Speaker 1: utter astonishment which overcame the Professor on making this extraordinary discovery. Amazement, incredulity,
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  Speaker 1: and rage were blended in such a way as to
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  Speaker 1: alarm me. During the whole course of my life. I
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  Speaker 1: had never seen a man at first so chap fallen
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  Speaker 1: and then so furiously indignant. The terrible fatigues of our
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  Speaker 1: sea voyage, the fearful dangers we had passed through, had
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  Speaker 1: all all gone for nothing. We had to begin them
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  Speaker 1: all over again, instead of progressing as we fondly expected
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  Speaker 1: during a voyage of so many days, we had retreated.
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  Speaker 1: Every hour of our expedition on the raft had been
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  Speaker 1: so much lost time. Presently, however, the indomitable energy of
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  Speaker 1: my uncle overcame every other consideration. So he said between
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  Speaker 1: his set teeth, fatality will play me these terrible tricks.
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  Speaker 1: The elements themselves conspire to overwhelm me with modification, air, fire,
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  Speaker 1: and water, combine their united efforts to oppose my passage. Well,
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  Speaker 1: they shall see what the earnest will of a determined
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  Speaker 1: man can do. I will not yield. I will not
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  Speaker 1: retreat even one inch, and we shall see who shall
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  Speaker 1: triumph in this great contest, Man or nature. Standing upright
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  Speaker 1: on a rock, irritated and menacing, Professor Hartwig, like the
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  Speaker 1: ferocious Ayaks, seemed to defy the fates. I, however, took
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  Speaker 1: upon myself to interfere and to impose some sort of
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  Speaker 1: check upon such insensate enthusis siasm. Listen to me, uncle,
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  Speaker 1: I said, in a firm but temperate tone of voice.
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  Speaker 1: There must be some limit to ambition here below. It
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  Speaker 1: is utterly useless to struggle against the impossible. Pray, listen
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  Speaker 1: to reason. We are utterly unprepared for a sea voyage.
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  Speaker 1: It is simply madness to think of performing a journey
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  Speaker 1: of five hundred leagues upon a wretched pile of beams,
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  Speaker 1: with a counterpane for a sail, a paltry stick for
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  Speaker 1: a mast, and attempest to contend with as we are
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  Speaker 1: totally incapable of steering our frail craft, which have become
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  Speaker 1: the mere plaything of the storm. And it is acting
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  Speaker 1: the part of madmen if we a second time run
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  Speaker 1: any risk upon this dangerous and treacherous central sea. These
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  Speaker 1: are only a few of the reasons and arguments I
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  Speaker 1: put together, reasons and arguments which to me appeared unanswered.
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  Speaker 1: I was allowed to go on without interruption for about
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  Speaker 1: ten minutes the explanation to this I soon discovered the
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  Speaker 1: professor was not even listening, and did not hear a
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  Speaker 1: word of all my eloquence to the raft. He cried
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  Speaker 1: in a hoarse voice when I paused for a reply.
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  Speaker 1: Such was the result of my strenuous effort to resist
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  Speaker 1: his iron will. I tried again, I begged and implored him.
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  Speaker 1: I got into a passion, but I had to deal
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  Speaker 1: with a will more determined than my own. I seemed
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  Speaker 1: to feel like the waves, which fought un battled against
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  Speaker 1: the huge mass of granite at our feet, which had
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  Speaker 1: smiled grimly for so many ages at their puny efforts. Hans, meanwhile,
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  Speaker 1: without taking part in our discussion, had been repairing the raft.
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  Speaker 1: One would have supposed that he instinctively guessed at the
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  Speaker 1: further projects of my uncle. By means of some fragments
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  Speaker 1: of cordage, he had again made the raft seaworthy. While
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  Speaker 1: I had been speaking, he had hoisted a new mast
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  Speaker 1: and sail, the latter already fluttering and waving in the breeze.
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  Speaker 1: The worthy professor spoke a few words to our imperturbable guide,
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  Speaker 1: who immediately began to put our baggage on board and
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  Speaker 1: to prepare for our departure. The atmosphere was now tolerably
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  Speaker 1: clear and pure, and the northeast wind blew steadily and serenely.
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  Speaker 1: It appeared likely to last for some time. What then,
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  Speaker 1: could I do? Could I undertake to resist the iron
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  Speaker 1: will of two men? It was simply impossible. If even
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  Speaker 1: I could have hoped for the support of hands, this, however,
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  Speaker 1: was out of the question. It appeared to me that
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  Speaker 1: the Icelander had set aside all personstional will and identity.
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  Speaker 1: He was a picture of abnegation. I could hope for
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  Speaker 1: nothing from one so infatuated with and devoted to his master.
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  Speaker 1: All I could do, therefore, was to swim with a
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  Speaker 1: stream in a mood of stolid and sullen resignation. I
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  Speaker 1: was about to take my accustomed place on the raft
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  Speaker 1: when my uncle placed his hand upon my shoulder. There
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  Speaker 1: is no hurry, my boy, he said, we shall not
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  Speaker 1: start until to morrow. I looked a picture of resignation
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  Speaker 1: to the dire will of fate. Under the circumstances, he said,
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  Speaker 1: I ought to neglect no precautions. As fate has cast
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  Speaker 1: me upon these shores, I shall not leave without having
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  Speaker 1: completely examined them. In order to understand this remark, I
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  Speaker 1: must explain that though we had been driven back to
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  Speaker 1: the northern shore, we had landed at the very different
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  Speaker 1: spot from that which had been our starting point for Gretchen.
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  Speaker 1: Must we calculated me very much to the westward. Nothing
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  Speaker 1: therefore was more natural and reasonable than that we should
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  Speaker 1: reckon not this new shore upon which we had so
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  Speaker 1: unexpectedly landed. Let us go on a journey of discovery,
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  Speaker 1: I cried, and, leaving hands to its important operation, we
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  Speaker 1: started on our expedition. The distance between the foreshore at
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  Speaker 1: higher water and the foot of the rocks was considerable.
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  Speaker 1: It would take about half an hour's walking to get
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  Speaker 1: from one to the other. As we trudged along, our
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  Speaker 1: feet crushed innumerable shells of every shape and size. Once
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  Speaker 1: the dwelling place of animals of every period of creation.
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  Speaker 1: I particularly noticed some enormous shells carapasses turtle and tortwis species,
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  Speaker 1: the diameter of which exceeded fifteen feet. They had in
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  Speaker 1: past ages belonged to those gigantic klyptodons of the Pliocene period,
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  Speaker 1: of which the modern turtle is but a minute specimen.
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  Speaker 1: In addition, the whole soil was covered by a vast
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  Speaker 1: quantity of stony relics, having the appearance of flints worn
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  Speaker 1: by the action of the waves, and lying in successive layers,
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  Speaker 1: one above the other. I came to the conclusion that
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  Speaker 1: in past ages, the sea must have covered the whole district.
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  Speaker 1: Upon the scattered rocks now laying far beyond its reach,
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  Speaker 1: the mighty waves of ages had left evident marks of
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  Speaker 1: their passage. On reflection, this appeared to me partially to
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  Speaker 1: explain the existence of this remarkable ocean forty leagues below
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  Speaker 1: the surface of the Earth's crust. According to my new
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  Speaker 1: and perhaps fanciful theory, this liquid mass must be gradually
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  Speaker 1: lost in the deep bowels of the Earth. I had
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  Speaker 1: also no doubt that this mysterious sea was fed by
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  Speaker 1: infiltration of the ocean above through imperceptible fissures. Nevertheless, it
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  Speaker 1: was impossible not to admit that these fissures must now
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  Speaker 1: be nearly choked up, for if not the cavern, or
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  Speaker 1: rather the immense stupendous reservoir would have been completely filled
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  Speaker 1: in a short space of time. Perhaps even this water,
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  Speaker 1: having to contend against the accumulated subterraneous fires of the
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  Speaker 1: interior of the earth, had become partially vaporized. Hence the
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  Speaker 1: explanation of those heavy clouds suspended over our heads, and
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  Speaker 1: the superabundant display of that electricity which occasioned such terrible
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  Speaker 1: storms in this deep and cavernous sea. This lucid explanation
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  Speaker 1: of the phenomena we had witnessed appeared to be quite satisfactory.
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  Speaker 1: However great and might the marvelsome nature may seem to us,
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  Speaker 1: they are always to be explained by physical reasons. Everything
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  Speaker 1: is subordinate to some great law of nature. It now
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  Speaker 1: appeared clear that we were walking upon a kind of
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  Speaker 1: sedimentary soil, formed like all the soils of that period,
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  Speaker 1: so frequent on the surface of the globe by the
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  Speaker 1: subsidence of the waters. The professor, who was now in
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  Speaker 1: his element, carefully examined every rock officure let him only
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  Speaker 1: find an opening, and it directly became important to him
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  Speaker 1: to examine its depth. For a whole mile we followed
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  Speaker 1: the windings of the central Sea, when Suddenly an important
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  Speaker 1: change took place in the aspect of the soil. It
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  Speaker 1: seemed to have been rudely cast up, convulsionized, as it were,
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  Speaker 1: by a violent upheaving of the lower strata in many places.
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  Speaker 1: Hollows here and hell there attested great dislocations at some
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  Speaker 1: other period of the terrestrial mass. We advanced with great
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  Speaker 1: difficulty over the broken masses of granite mixed with flint, quartz,
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  Speaker 1: and alluvial deposits. When a large field, more even than
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  Speaker 1: a field a plain of bones appeared suddenly before our eyes.
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  Speaker 1: It looked like an immense cemetery where generation after generation
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  Speaker 1: had mingled their mortal dust. Lofty barrels of early remains
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  Speaker 1: rose at intervals, they undulated away to the limits of
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  Speaker 1: the distant horizon, and were lost in a thick and
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  Speaker 1: brown fog. On that spot, some three square miles in extent,
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  Speaker 1: was accumulated the whole history of animal life. Scarcely one
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  Speaker 1: creature upon the comparatively modern soil of the upper and
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  Speaker 1: inhabited world had not there existed. Nevertheless, we were drawn
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  Speaker 1: forward by an all absorbing and impatient curiosity. Our feet
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  Speaker 1: crushed with a dry and crackling sound. The remains of
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  Speaker 1: those prehistoric fossils for which the museums of great city squarrel,
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  Speaker 1: even when they obtained only rare and curious morsels. A thousand,
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  Speaker 1: Such naturalists as Cuvier would not have sufficed to recompose
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  Speaker 1: the skeletons of the organic beings which lay in this
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  Speaker 1: magnificent osseous collection. I was utterly confounded. My uncle stood
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  Speaker 1: for some minutes with his arms raised on high towards
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  Speaker 1: the thick granite vault which served us for a sky.
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  Speaker 1: His mouth was wide open, his eyes sparkled wildly behind
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  Speaker 1: his spectacles, which he had fortunately saved. His head bobbed
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  Speaker 1: up and down and from side to side, while his
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  Speaker 1: whole attitude and mien expressed unbounded astonishment. He stood in
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  Speaker 1: the presence of an endless, wondrous and inexhaustible, rich collection
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  Speaker 1: of antediluvian monsters, piled up for his own private and
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  Speaker 1: peculiar satisfaction. Fancy, an enthusiastic lover of books, carried suddenly
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  Speaker 1: into the very midst of the famous Library of Alexandria,
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  Speaker 1: burned by the sacrilegious omer, and which some miracle had
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  Speaker 1: restored to its pristine splendor. Such was something of the
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  Speaker 1: state of mind in which Uncle Hartwig was now placed.
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  Speaker 1: For some time he stood thus literally aghast at the
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  Speaker 1: magnitude of his discovery. But it was even a greater
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  Speaker 1: excitement when, darting widely over this mass of organic dust,
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  Speaker 1: he caught up a naked skull and addressed me in
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  Speaker 1: a quivering voice. Hurry, my boy, hurry, this is a
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  Speaker 1: human head. A human head, Uncle I said, no less
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  Speaker 1: amazed and stupefied than himself. Yes, nephew, ah, mister milln Edwards, Ah,
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  Speaker 1: mister de quatrafugs, why are you not here? Where I am? I?
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  Speaker 1: Professor Hartwig. End of Chapter thirty four.