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42 - The Volcanic Shaft - Journey to the Center of the Earth - Jules Verne · Classic Science Fiction Books

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  Speaker 1: Chapter forty two. The volcanic shaft Man's constitution is so
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  Speaker 1: peculiar that his held is purely a negative matter. No
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  Speaker 1: sooner is the rage of hunger a peace than it
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  Speaker 1: becomes difficult to comprehend the meaning of starvation. It is
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  Speaker 1: only when you suffer that you really understand. As to
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  Speaker 1: any one who has not endured privation, having any notion
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  Speaker 1: of the matter, it is simply absurd. With us. After
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  Speaker 1: a long fast, some mouthfuls of bread and meat, a
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  Speaker 1: little moldy biscuit and salt beef triumphed over all our
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  Speaker 1: previous gloomy and saturnine thoughts. Nevertheless, after this repast, each
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  Speaker 1: gave way to his own reflections. I wondered, what were
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  Speaker 1: those of hands the man of the extreme north, who
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  Speaker 1: was yet gifted with the fatalistic resignation of oriental character.
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  Speaker 1: But the utmost stretch of the imagination would not allow
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  Speaker 1: me to realize the truth. As for my individual self,
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  Speaker 1: my thoughts had ceased to be anything but memories of
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  Speaker 1: the past, and were all connected with that upper world
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  Speaker 1: which I never should have left. I saw it all now,
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  Speaker 1: the beautiful house in the Kernish trasse, my poor Gretchen,
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  Speaker 1: the good Martha. They all passed before my mind, lack
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  Speaker 1: visions of the past. Every time any of the lugubrious
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  Speaker 1: groanings which were to be distinguished in the hollow surround
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  Speaker 1: fell upon my ears, I fancied, I heard the distant
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  Speaker 1: murmur of the great cities above my head. As for
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  Speaker 1: my uncle, always thinking of his science, he examined the
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  Speaker 1: nature of the shaft by means of a torch. He
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  Speaker 1: closely examined the different strata one about the other, in
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  Speaker 1: order to recognize his situation by geological theory. This calculation,
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  Speaker 1: or rather this estimation, could by no means, be anything
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  Speaker 1: but approximate. But a learned man, a philosopher, is nothing
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  Speaker 1: if not a philosopher when he keeps his ideas calm
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  Speaker 1: and collected. And certainly the professor possessed this quality to perfection.
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  Speaker 1: I heard him as I sat in silence, murmuring words
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  Speaker 1: of geological science. As I understood his object and his meaning,
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  Speaker 1: I could not but interest myself, despite my preoccupation, in
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  Speaker 1: that terrible hour. A eruptive granite, he said to himself,
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  Speaker 1: we are still in the primitive epoch, but we are
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  Speaker 1: going up, going up, still going up, But who knows?
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  Speaker 1: Who knows? Then he still hoped. He felt along the
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  Speaker 1: vertical sides of the shaft with his hand, and some
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  Speaker 1: few minutes later he would go on again in the
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  Speaker 1: following style. This is gnace, This is mykaschist cilicious mineral.
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  Speaker 1: Good again, this is the epoch of transition. At all events,
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  Speaker 1: we are close to them. And then, and then, what
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  Speaker 1: could the professor mean? Could he, by any conceivable means
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  Speaker 1: measure the thickness of the crust of the earth suspended
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  Speaker 1: above our heads? Did he possess any possible means of
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  Speaker 1: making any approximation to this calculation? No, the manometer was wanting,
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  Speaker 1: and no summary estimation could take the place of it.
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  Speaker 1: And yet as we progressed, the temperature increased in the
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  Speaker 1: most extraordinary degree, and I began to feel as if
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  Speaker 1: I were bathed in a hot and burning atmosphere. Never
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  Speaker 1: before had I felt anything like it. I could only
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  Speaker 1: compare it to the hot vapor from an iron foundry,
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  Speaker 1: when the liquid iron is in a state of ebullition
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  Speaker 1: and runs over by degrees. And one after the other, Hans,
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  Speaker 1: my uncle and myself had taken off our coats and waistcoats.
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  Speaker 1: They were unbearable. Even the slightest garment was not only uncomfortable,
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  Speaker 1: but the course of extreme suffering. Are we ascending to
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  Speaker 1: a living fire? I cried, when, to my horror and astonishment,
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  Speaker 1: the heat became greater than before. No, no, said my uncle.
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  Speaker 1: It is simply impossible, quite impossible. And yet, said I,
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  Speaker 1: touching the side of the shaft with my naked hand,
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  Speaker 1: this wall is literally burning. At this moment, feeling as
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  Speaker 1: I did that the sights of this extraordinary wall were
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  Speaker 1: red hot, I plunged my hands into the water to
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  Speaker 1: cool them. I drew them back with a cry of despair.
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  Speaker 1: The water is boiling, I cried my uncle. The professor
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  Speaker 1: made no reply other than a gesture of rage and despair.
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  Speaker 1: Something very like the truth had probably struck his imagination.
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  Speaker 1: But I could take no share in either what was
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  Speaker 1: going on or in his speculations. An invincible dreed had
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  Speaker 1: taken possession of my brain and soul. I could only
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  Speaker 1: look forward to an immediate catastrophe. Such a catastrophe as
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  Speaker 1: not even the most vivid imagination could have thought of.
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  Speaker 1: An idea, at first vague and uncertain, was gradually being
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  Speaker 1: changed into certainty. I tremulously rejected it at first, but
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  Speaker 1: it forced itself upon me by degrees with extreme obstinacy.
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  Speaker 1: It was so terrible an idea that I scarcely dared
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  Speaker 1: to whisper it to myself, And yet all the while,
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  Speaker 1: certain as it were, involuntary observations determined my convictions. By
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  Speaker 1: the doubtful glare of the talk, I could make out
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  Speaker 1: some singular changes in the granity strata. A strange and
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  Speaker 1: terrible phenomenon was about to be produced, in which electricity
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  Speaker 1: played a part. Then this boiling water, this terrible and
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  Speaker 1: excessive heat, I determined as a last resource to examine
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  Speaker 1: the compass. The compass had gone mad, Yes, fully stark,
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  Speaker 1: staring mad. The needle jumped from pool to pool with
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  Speaker 1: sudden and surprising jerks, ran round, or, as it is said,
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  Speaker 1: boxed the compass, and then ran suddenly back again, as
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  Speaker 1: if it had the vertigon. I was aware that, according
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  Speaker 1: to the best acknowledged theories, it was a received notion
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  Speaker 1: that the mineral crust of the globe is never and
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  Speaker 1: never has been, in a state of complete tripose. It
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  Speaker 1: is perpetually undergoing the modifications caused by the deco composition
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  Speaker 1: of internal matter, the agitation consequent on the flowing of
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  Speaker 1: extensive liquid currents, the excessive action of magnetis which tends
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  Speaker 1: to shake it incessantly at a time when even the
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  Speaker 1: multitudinous beings on its surface do not suspect the seeding
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  Speaker 1: process to be going on. Still, this phenomenon would not
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  Speaker 1: have alarmed me alone. It would not have roused in
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  Speaker 1: my mind a terrible an awful idea. But other facts
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  Speaker 1: could not allow my self delusion to last. Terrible detonations
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  Speaker 1: like Heaven's artillery began to multiply themselves with fearful intensity.
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  Speaker 1: I could only compare them with the noise made by
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  Speaker 1: hundreds of heavily laden chariots being madly driven over a
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  Speaker 1: stone pavement. It was a continuous roll of heavy thunder,
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  Speaker 1: and then the mad compass, shaken by the wild electric phenomena,
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  Speaker 1: conferred me in my rapidly formed opinion. The mineral crust
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  Speaker 1: was about to burst. The heavy granite masses were about
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  Speaker 1: to rejoin. The fizzure was about to close. The void
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  Speaker 1: was about to be filled up, and we poor atoms
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  Speaker 1: to be crushed in its awful embrace. Uncle Uncle, I cried,
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  Speaker 1: we are fully irretrievably lost. What, then, my young friend,
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  Speaker 1: is your new cause of terror and alarm? He said,
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  Speaker 1: in his calmest manner. What fear you know? What do
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  Speaker 1: I fear? Now? I cried in fierce and angry tones.
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  Speaker 1: Do you not see that the walls of the shaft
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  Speaker 1: are in motion? Do you not see that the solid
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  Speaker 1: granite masses are cracking? Do you not feel the terrible
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  Speaker 1: torrid heat? Do you not observe the awful boiling water
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  Speaker 1: on which we float? Do you not remark this mad
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  Speaker 1: needle every sign importent of an awful earthquake? My uncle
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  Speaker 1: coolly shook his head. An earthquake, he replied, in the
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  Speaker 1: most calm and provoking tone. Yes, my nephew, I tell
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  Speaker 1: you that you are utterly mistaken. He continued, Do you
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  Speaker 1: not can you not recognize all the well known symptoms
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  Speaker 1: of an earthquake? By no means? I am expecting something
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  Speaker 1: far more important. My brain is strained beyond endurance. What
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  Speaker 1: what do you mean? I cried? An eruption. Hurry, an eruption,
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  Speaker 1: I gasped. We are then in the volcanic shaft of
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  Speaker 1: a crater, in full action and vigor. I have every
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  Speaker 1: reason to think, so, said the professor in a smiling tone.
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  Speaker 1: And I beg to tell you that it is the
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  Speaker 1: most fortunate thing that could happen to us, the most
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  Speaker 1: est fortunate thing. Had my uncle really and truly gone mad?
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  Speaker 1: What did he mean by these awful words? What did
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  Speaker 1: he mean by this terrible calm, this solemn smile? What
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  Speaker 1: cried I in the height of my exasperation. We are
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  Speaker 1: on the weight an eruption? Are we? Fatality has cast
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  Speaker 1: us into a well of burning and boiling lava, of rocks,
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  Speaker 1: on fire, of boiling water, in a word, filled with
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  Speaker 1: every kind of eruptive matter. We are about to be expelled,
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  Speaker 1: thrown up, vomited, spit out the interior of the earth,
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  Speaker 1: in common with huge blocks of granite, with showers of
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  Speaker 1: cinders and scoria, in a wild whirlwind of flame. And
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  Speaker 1: you say, the most fortunate thing which could happen to us? Yes,
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  Speaker 1: replied the professor, looking at me calmly from under his spectacles.
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  Speaker 1: It is the only chance which remains to was of
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  Speaker 1: ever escaping from the interior of the earth to the
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  Speaker 1: light of day. It is quite impossible that I can
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  Speaker 1: put on paper the thousand strange, wild thoughts which followed
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  Speaker 1: this extraordinary announcement. But my uncle was right, quite right,
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  Speaker 1: And never had he appeared to me so audacious and
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  Speaker 1: so convinced as when he looked me calmly in the
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  Speaker 1: face and spoke of the chances of an eruption, of
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  Speaker 1: our being cast upon Mother Earth once more through the
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  Speaker 1: gaping crater of a volcano. Nevertheless, while we were speaking,
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  Speaker 1: we were still ascending. We passed the whole night going up, or,
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  Speaker 1: to speak more scientifically, in an accessional motion. The fearful
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  Speaker 1: noise redoubled. I was ready to suffocate. I seriously believed
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  Speaker 1: that my last hours was approaching. And yet so strange
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  Speaker 1: is imagination. All I thought of was some childish hypothesis
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  Speaker 1: or other. In such circumstances, you do not choose your
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  Speaker 1: own thoughts. They overcome you. It was quite evident that
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  Speaker 1: we were being cast upwards by eruptive matter. Under the
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  Speaker 1: raft there was a mass of boiling water, and under
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  Speaker 1: this was a heavy mass of lava and an aggregate
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  Speaker 1: of rocks, which, on reaching the summit of the water,
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  Speaker 1: would be dispersed in every direction. That we were inside
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  Speaker 1: the chimney of a volcano, there could no longer be
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  Speaker 1: the shadow of a doubt. Nothing more terrible could be conceived.
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  Speaker 1: But on this occasion, instead of sneffles an old and
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  Speaker 1: extinct volcano, we were inside a mountain of fire in
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  Speaker 1: full activity. Several times I found myself asking what mount
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  Speaker 1: in was it and on what part of the world
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  Speaker 1: we should be shot out? As if it were of
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  Speaker 1: any consequence in the northern regions. There could be no
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  Speaker 1: reasonable doubt about that. Before it went decidedly mad, a
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  Speaker 1: compass had never made the slightest mistake. From the cape
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  Speaker 1: of Sacnussem. We had been swept away to the northward
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  Speaker 1: many hundreds of leagues. Now the question was, were we
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  Speaker 1: once more under Iceland. Should we be belched forth on
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  Speaker 1: to the earth through the crater of Mont Hecla, or
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  Speaker 1: should we reappear through one of the other seven fire
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  Speaker 1: funnels of the island. Taking in my mental vision of
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  Speaker 1: rages of five hundred leagues to the westward, I could
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  Speaker 1: see under this parallel only the little known volcanos of
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  Speaker 1: the northwest coast of America. To the east, one only
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  Speaker 1: existed somewhere about the eightieth degree of latitude, the esk
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  Speaker 1: upon the island of John Mayon not far from the
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  Speaker 1: frozen regions of Spitzbergen. It was not greatest that were wanting,
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  Speaker 1: and many of them were big enough to vomit the
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  Speaker 1: whole army. All I wished to know was the particular
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  Speaker 1: one towards which we were making with such fearful velocity.
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  Speaker 1: I often think now of my folly, as if I
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  Speaker 1: should ever have expected to escape Towards morning, the ascending
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  Speaker 1: motion became greater and greater if the degree of heat
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  Speaker 1: increased instead of decreasing as we approached the surface of
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  Speaker 1: the earth. It was simply because the causes were local
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  Speaker 1: and folly due to volcanic influence. Our very style of
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  Speaker 1: locomotion left in my mind no doubt upon the subject.
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  Speaker 1: An enormous force, a force of several hundreds of atmospheres
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  Speaker 1: produced by the vapors accumulated and long compressed in the
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  Speaker 1: interior of the Earth, was hoisting us upwards with irresistible power.
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  Speaker 1: But though we were approaching the light of day, to
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  Speaker 1: what fearful dangers were we about to be exposed? Instant
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  Speaker 1: death appeared the only fate which we could expect or contemplate. Soon,
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  Speaker 1: a dim sepulchray light penetrated the vertical gallery, which became
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  Speaker 1: wider and wider. I could make out to the right
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  Speaker 1: and left, long dark corridors, like immense tunnels, from which
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  Speaker 1: awful and horror vapors poured out. Tongues of fire, sparkling
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  Speaker 1: and crackling, appeared about to lick us up. The hour
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  Speaker 1: had come. Look, uncle, look, I cried, Well, what you
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: see are the great sulfurous flames, nothing more common in
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  Speaker 1: connection with an eruption. But if they laps round, I
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  Speaker 1: angrily replied, they will not love us round, was his
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  Speaker 1: quiet and serene answer. But it will be all the
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  Speaker 1: same in the end. If they stifle us, I cried,
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  Speaker 1: We shall not be stifled. The gallery is rapidly becoming
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  Speaker 1: wider and wider, and if it be necessary, we will
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  Speaker 1: presently leave the raft and take refuge in some fissure
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  Speaker 1: in the rock. But the water, the water which is
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  Speaker 1: continually ascending, I despairingly replied, There is no longer any water. Harry,
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  Speaker 1: he answered, but the kind of lava paste which is
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  Speaker 1: heaving us up in company with itself, to the mouth
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  Speaker 1: of the crater. In truth, the liquid column of water
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  Speaker 1: had fully disappeared to give place to dense masses of
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  Speaker 1: boiling eruptive matter. The temperature was becoming utterly insupportable, and
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  Speaker 1: a thermometer exposed to this atmosphere would have marked between
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  Speaker 1: one hundred and eighty nine and one hundred ninety degrees fahrenheight.
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: Perspiration rushed from every pore, But for the extraordinary rapidity
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  Speaker 1: of our ascent, we should have been stifled. Nevertheless, the
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  Speaker 1: professor did not carry out his proposition of abandoning the raft,
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  Speaker 1: and he did quite wisely. Those few ill joined beams
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  Speaker 1: offered anyway a solid surface, a support which elsewhere must
• 17:30
  Speaker 1: have utterly failed us. Towards eight o'clock in the morning,
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  Speaker 1: a new incident startled us. The ascensional movement suddenly ceased.
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  Speaker 1: The raft became still and motionless. What is the matter now,
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  Speaker 1: I said, querulously, very much startled by this change, A
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  Speaker 1: simple halt, replied my uncle. Is the eruption about to fail?
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  Speaker 1: I asked, I hope not. Without making any reply, I rose.
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  Speaker 1: I tried to look around me. Perhaps the raft checked
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  Speaker 1: by some projecting rock, opposed a momentary resistance to the
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  Speaker 1: eruptive mass. In this case, it was absolutely necessary to
• 18:13
  Speaker 1: release it as quickly as possible. Nothing of the kind
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  Speaker 1: had occurred. The colon of cinders, of scoria, of broken rocks,
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  Speaker 1: and earth had folly ceased to ascend. I tell you,
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  Speaker 1: uncle that the eruption has stopped. Was my oracular decision, Ah,
• 18:33
  Speaker 1: said my uncle. You think so, My boy, you are wrong.
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  Speaker 1: Do not be in the least alarmed. This sudden moment
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  Speaker 1: of calm will not last long. Be assured. It has
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  Speaker 1: already endured five minutes, and before we are many minutes older,
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  Speaker 1: we shall be continuing our journey to the mouth of
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: the crater. All the time he was speaking, the professor
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: continued to consult his chronometer, and he was probably right
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  Speaker 1: in his prognostics. Soon the raft resumed its motion in
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  Speaker 1: a very rapid and disorderly way, which lasted two minutes
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  Speaker 1: or thereabout, And then again it stopped as suddenly as before. Good,
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  Speaker 1: said my uncle, observing the hour in ten we shall
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  Speaker 1: start again in ten minutes. Yes, precisely. We have to
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  Speaker 1: do with the volcano, the eruption of which is intermittent.
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  Speaker 1: We are compelled to breathe just as it does. Nothing
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: could be more true. At the exact minute he had indicated,
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: we were again launched on high with extreme rapidity, not
• 19:42
  Speaker 1: to be cast off the raft, it was necessary to
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: hold on to the beams. Then the hoist again ceased.
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  Speaker 1: Many times since have I thought of this singular phenomenon
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  Speaker 1: without being able to find for it any satisfactory explanation. Nevertheless,
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  Speaker 1: it appeared clear to me that we were not in
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  Speaker 1: the principal chimney of the volcano, but in a necessary conduit,
• 20:07
  Speaker 1: where we felt the countershock of the great and principal
• 20:11
  Speaker 1: tunnel filled by burning lava. It is impossible for me
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  Speaker 1: to say how many times this maneuver was repeated. All
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: that I can remember is that on every escensional motion
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: we were hoisted up with ever increasing velocity, as if
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: we had been launched from a huge projectile. During the
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: sudden halls, we were nearly stifled. During the moments of projection,
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: the hot air took away our breath. I thought for
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: a moment of the voluptuous joy of suddenly finding myself
• 20:44
  Speaker 1: in the Hyperborean regions, with a cold thirty degrees below Sero.
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: My exalted imagination pictures to itself the vast, snowy plains
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: of the Arctic regions, and I was impatient to roll
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: myself on the icicle carpet of the north pole by degrees.
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: My head, utterly overcome by a series of violent emotions,
• 21:07
  Speaker 1: began to give way to hallucination. I was delirious. Had
• 21:12
  Speaker 1: it not been for the powerful arms of Hans the Guide,
• 21:16
  Speaker 1: I should have broken my head against the granite masses
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: of the shaft. I have, in consequence, kept no account
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: of what followed for many hours. I have a vague
• 21:27
  Speaker 1: and confused remembrance of continual detonations, of the shaking of
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: the huge granitick mass, and of the raft going round
• 21:36
  Speaker 1: like a spinning top. It floated on the stream of
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: hot lava amidst a falling cloud of cinders. The huge
• 21:44
  Speaker 1: flames roaring wrapped us around. A storm of wind which
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: appeared to be cast forth from an immense ventilator, roused
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: up the interior fires of the earth. It was a hot,
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: incandescent blast. At last I saw the figure of hands,
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  Speaker 1: as if enveloped in the huge halo of burning blaze.
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: And no other sense remained to me but that sinister
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  Speaker 1: read which the condemned victim may be supposed to feel
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  Speaker 1: when led to the mouth of a cannon. At the
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  Speaker 1: supreme moment, when the shot is fired and his limbs
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  Speaker 1: are dispersed into empty space. End of chapter forty two.