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01 - At The Earth's Core - Edgar Rice Burroughs · Classic Adventure Books - Daily

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Speaker 1: Chapter one, Toward the Eternal Fires. I was born in
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Speaker 1: Connecticut about thirty years ago. My name is David Innes.
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Speaker 1: My father was a wealthy mine owner. When I was
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Speaker 1: nineteen he died. All his property was to be mine
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Speaker 1: when I had attained my majority, provided that I had
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Speaker 1: devoted the two years intervening in close application to the
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Speaker 1: great business I was to inherit. I did my best
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Speaker 1: to fulfill the last wishes of my parent, not because
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Speaker 1: of the inheritance, but because I loved and honored my father.
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Speaker 1: For six months I toiled in the mines and in
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Speaker 1: the counting rooms, for I wished to know every minute
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Speaker 1: detail of the business. Then Perry interested me in his invention.
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Speaker 1: He was an old fellow who had devoted the better
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Speaker 1: part of a long life to the perfection of a
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Speaker 1: mechanical subterranean prospector. As relaxation, he studied paleontology. I looked
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Speaker 1: over his plans, listened to his arguments, inspected his working model,
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Speaker 1: and then convinced I advanced the funds necessary to construct
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Speaker 1: a full sized practical prospector. I shall not go into
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Speaker 1: the details of its construction. It lies out there in
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Speaker 1: the desert now about two miles from here tomorrow, you
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Speaker 1: may care to ride out and see it. Roughly. It
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Speaker 1: is a steel cylinder one hundred feet long, and jointed
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Speaker 1: so that it may turn and twist through solid rock
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Speaker 1: if need be. At one end is a mighty revolving drill,
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Speaker 1: operated by an engine, which Perry said generated more power
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Speaker 1: to the cubic inch than any other engine did to
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Speaker 1: the cubic foot. I remember that he used to claim
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Speaker 1: that that invention alone would make us fabulously wealthy. We
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Speaker 1: were going to make the whole thing public after the
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Speaker 1: successful issue of our first secret trial, But Perry never
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Speaker 1: turned from that trial trip, and I only after ten
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Speaker 1: years I recall, as it were, but yesterday, the night
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Speaker 1: of that momentous occasion upon which we were to test
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Speaker 1: the practicality of that wondrous invention. It was near midnight
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Speaker 1: when we repaired to the lofty tower in which Perry
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Speaker 1: had constructed his iron mole, as he was wont to
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Speaker 1: call the thing, the great nose rested upon the bare
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Speaker 1: earth of the floor. We passed through the doors into
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Speaker 1: the outer jacket, secured them, and then passed on into
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Speaker 1: the cabin, which contained the controlling mechanism within the inner
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Speaker 1: tube switched on the electric lights. Perry looked to his generator,
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Speaker 1: to the great tanks that held the life giving chemicals
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Speaker 1: with which he was to manufacture fresh air to replace
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Speaker 1: that which we consumed in breathing, to his instruments for
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Speaker 1: recording temperature, speed, distance, and for examining the materials through
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Speaker 1: which we were to pass. He tested the steering device
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Speaker 1: and overlook the mighty cogs which transmitted its marvelous velocity
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Speaker 1: to the giant drill at the nose of his strange craft.
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Speaker 1: Our seats into which we strapped ourselves were so arranged
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Speaker 1: upon transverse bars that we would be upright whether the
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Speaker 1: craft were plowing her way downward into the bowels of
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Speaker 1: the earth, or running horizontally along some great seam of coal,
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Speaker 1: or rising vertically towards the surface. Again. At length, all
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Speaker 1: was ready, Perry bowed his head in prayer. For a
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Speaker 1: moment we were silent, and then the old man's hand
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Speaker 1: grasped the starting lever. There was a frightful roaring beneath us.
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Speaker 1: The giant frame trembled and vibrated. There was a rush
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Speaker 1: of sound as the loose earth passed up through the
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Speaker 1: hollow space between the inner and outer jackets to be
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Speaker 1: deposited in our wake. We were off. The noise was deafening,
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Speaker 1: the sensation was frightful. For a full miname and minute,
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Speaker 1: neither of us could do aught but cling, with that
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Speaker 1: proverbial desperation of the drowning man, to the handrails of
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Speaker 1: our swinging seats. Then Parry glanced at the thermometer. Gad,
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Speaker 1: he cried, it cannot be possible. Quick, what does the
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Speaker 1: distance meter read? That and the speedometer were both on
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Speaker 1: my side of the cabin, and as I turned to
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Speaker 1: take a reading from the former, I could see Perry
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Speaker 1: muttering ten degrees rise, it cannot be possible. And then
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Speaker 1: I saw him tug frantically upon the steering wheel. As
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Speaker 1: I finally found the tiny needle in the dim light,
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Speaker 1: I translated Perry's evident excitement, and my heart sank within me.
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Speaker 1: But when I spoke, I hid the fear which haunted me.
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Speaker 1: It will be seven hundred feet, Parry, I said, But
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Speaker 1: by the time you can turn her into the horizontal,
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Speaker 1: you'd better give me a hand, then, my boy, he replied,
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Speaker 1: for I cannot budge her out of the vertical alone.
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Speaker 1: God give that our combined strength may be equal to
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Speaker 1: the task, for else we are lost. I wormed my
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Speaker 1: way to the old man's side with never a doubt
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Speaker 1: but that the great wheel would yield on the instant
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Speaker 1: to the power of my young and vigorous muscles. Nor
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Speaker 1: was my belief mere vanity. For always had my physique
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Speaker 1: been the envy and despair of my fellows, And for
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Speaker 1: that very reason it had waxed even greater than nature
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Speaker 1: had intended. Since my natural pride in my great strength,
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Speaker 1: had led me to care for and develop my body
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Speaker 1: and my muscles by every means within my power, what
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Speaker 1: with boxing, football, and baseball. I had been in training
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Speaker 1: since childhood, and so it was with the utmost confidence
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Speaker 1: that I laid hold of the huge iron rim. But
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Speaker 1: though I threw every ounce of my strength into it,
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Speaker 1: my best effort was as unavailing as Perry's had been.
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Speaker 1: The thing would not budge the grim, insensate, horrible thing
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Speaker 1: that was holding us upon the straight road to death.
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Speaker 1: At length, I gave up the useless struggle, and without
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Speaker 1: a word, returned my seat. There was no need for words,
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Speaker 1: at least none that I could imagine, Unless Perry desired
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Speaker 1: to pray and I was quite sure that he would,
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Speaker 1: for he never left an opportunity neglected where he might
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Speaker 1: sandwich in a prayer. He prayed when he arose in
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Speaker 1: the morning, he prayed before he ate, he prayed when
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Speaker 1: he had finished eating, and before he went to bed
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Speaker 1: at night he prayed again. In between he often found
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Speaker 1: excuses to pray, even when the provocation seemed far fetched
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Speaker 1: to my worldly eyes. Now that he was about to die,
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Speaker 1: I felt positive that I should witness a perfect orgy
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Speaker 1: of prayer, if one may allude with such assembly to
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Speaker 1: so solemn act. But to my astonishment I discovered that,
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Speaker 1: with death staring him in the face, Abner Perry was
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Speaker 1: transformed into a new being. From his lips there flowed
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Speaker 1: not prayer, but a clear and limpid stream of undeluded profanity.
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Speaker 1: And it was all directed at that quietly, stubborn peace,
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Speaker 1: of unyielding mechanism. I should think, Perry. I chided that
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Speaker 1: a man of your professed religiousness would rather be at
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Speaker 1: his prayers than cursing in the presence of imminent death. Death,
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Speaker 1: he cried, death is it that appalls you? That is
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Speaker 1: nothing by comparison with the loss the world must suffer why, David,
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Speaker 1: Within this iron cylinder, we have demonstrated possibilities that science
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Speaker 1: has scarce dreamed. We have harnessed a new principle, and
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Speaker 1: with it animated a piece of steel with the power
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Speaker 1: of ten thousand men. That two lives will be snuffed
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Speaker 1: out is nothing to the world. Calamity that entombs in
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Speaker 1: the bowels of the earth. The discoveries that I have
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Speaker 1: made and proved in the successful construction of the thing
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Speaker 1: that is now carrying us farther and farther towards the
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Speaker 1: eternal central fires. I am frank to admit that for myself,
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Speaker 1: I was much more concerned with our own immediate future
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Speaker 1: than with any problematic loss which the world might be
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Speaker 1: about to suffer. The world was at least ignorant of
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Speaker 1: its bereavement, while to me it was a real and
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Speaker 1: terrible actuality. What can we do, I asked, hiding my
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Speaker 1: perturbation beneath the mask of a low and level voice.
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Speaker 1: We may stop here and die of asphyxiation when our
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Speaker 1: atmospheric tanks are empty, replied Perry. Or we may continue
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Speaker 1: on with the slight hope that we may later sufficiently
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Speaker 1: deflect the prospector from the vertical to carry us along
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Speaker 1: the arc of a great circle, which must eventually return
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Speaker 1: us to the surface. If we succeed in doing so,
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Speaker 1: before we reach the higher internal temperatures, we may even
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Speaker 1: yet survive. There would seem to me to be about
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Speaker 1: one chance in several million that we shall succeed. Otherwise
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Speaker 1: we shall die more quickly, but no more surely than
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Speaker 1: as though we sat supinely waiting for the torture of
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Speaker 1: a slow and horrible death. I glanced at the thermometer.
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Speaker 1: It registered one one hundred ten degrees. While we were talking,
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Speaker 1: the mighty iron mole had bored its way over a
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Speaker 1: mile into the rock of the Earth's crust. Let us
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Speaker 1: continue on, then, I replied, it should soon be over
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Speaker 1: at this rate. You never intimated that the speed of
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Speaker 1: this thing would be so high, Perry, didn't you know it? No,
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Speaker 1: he answered, I could not figure the speed exactly, for
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Speaker 1: I had no instrument for measuring the mighty power of
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Speaker 1: my generator. I reasoned, however, that we should make about
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Speaker 1: five hundred yards an hour, and we are making seven
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Speaker 1: miles an hour. I concluded for him, as I sat
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Speaker 1: with my eyes upon the distance meter, how thick is
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Speaker 1: the Earth's crust, Perry, I asked, There are almost as
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Speaker 1: many conjectures to that as there are geologists, was his answer.
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Speaker 1: One estimate is thirty miles, because the internal heat, increasing
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Speaker 1: at a rate of about one degree to each sixty
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Speaker 1: or seventy feet depth, would be sufficient to fuse the
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Speaker 1: most refractory substance at that distance beneath the Earth. Another
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Speaker 1: finds that the phenomenon of precession and nutation require that
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Speaker 1: the Earth, if not entirely solid, must at least have
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Speaker 1: a shell not less than eight hundred to a thousand
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Speaker 1: miles in thickness. So there you are. You may take
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Speaker 1: your choice, and if it should prove solid, I asked,
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Speaker 1: it will all be the same to us in the end,
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Speaker 1: David replied Perry. At the best, our fuel will suffice
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Speaker 1: to carry us but three or four days, while our
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Speaker 1: atmosphere cannot last to exceed three. Neither then is sufficient
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Speaker 1: to bear us in the safety through eight thousand miles
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Speaker 1: of rock to the antipodes. If the crust is of
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Speaker 1: sufficient thickness, we shall come to a final stop between
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Speaker 1: six and seven hundred miles beneath the Earth's surface. But
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Speaker 1: during the last hundred and fifty miles of our journey,
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Speaker 1: we shall be corpses. Am I correct? I asked, quite correct, David,
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Speaker 1: are you frightened? I do not know. It has all
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Speaker 1: come so suddenly that I scarce believed that either of
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Speaker 1: us realizes the real terrors of our position. I feel
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Speaker 1: that I should be reduced to panic, But yet I
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Speaker 1: am not. I imagine that the shock has been so
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Speaker 1: great as to partially stun our sensibilities. Again, I turned
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Speaker 1: to the thermometer. The mercury was rising with less rapidity.
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Speaker 1: It was now but one hundred forty degrees, although we
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Speaker 1: had penetrated to a depth of nearly four miles. I
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Speaker 1: told Perry, and he smiled. We have shattered one theory
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Speaker 1: at least, was his only comment, and then he returned
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Speaker 1: to his self assumed occupation of fluently cursing the stirring wheel.
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Speaker 1: I once heard a pirate swear, but his best efforts
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Speaker 1: would have seemed like those of a tyro alongside of
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Speaker 1: Perry's masterful and scientific imprecations. Once more, I tried my
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Speaker 1: hand at the wheel, but I might as well have
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Speaker 1: a say to swing the earth itself. In my suggestion,
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Speaker 1: Perry stopped the generator, and as we came to rest,
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Speaker 1: I again threw all my strength into a supreme effort
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Speaker 1: to move the thing, even a hair's breath, But the
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Speaker 1: results were as barren as when we had been traveling
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Speaker 1: at top speed. I shook my head sadly and motioned
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Speaker 1: to the starting lever. Parry pulled it toward him, and
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Speaker 1: once again we were plunging downward toward eternity at a
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Speaker 1: rate of seven miles an hour. I sat with my
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Speaker 1: eyes glued to the thermometer and the distance meter. The
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Speaker 1: mercury was rising very slowly now, though even at one
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Speaker 1: hundred forty five degrees it was almost unbearable within the
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Speaker 1: narrow confines of our metal prison. About noon, or twelve
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Speaker 1: hours after our start upon this unfortunate journey, we had
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Speaker 1: bored to a depth of eighty four miles, at which
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Speaker 1: point the mercury registered one hundred fifty three degrees fahrenheit.
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Speaker 1: Parry was becoming more hopeful, although upon what meager food
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Speaker 1: he sustained his optimism. I could not conjecture from cursing,
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Speaker 1: he had turned to singing. I felt that the strain
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Speaker 1: had at last affected his mind. For several hours, we
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Speaker 1: had not spoken, except as he asked me for the
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Speaker 1: readings of the instruments from time to time, and I
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Speaker 1: announced them. My thoughts were filled with vain regrets. I
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Speaker 1: recalled numerous acts of my past life which I should
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Speaker 1: have been glad to have had a few more years
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Speaker 1: to live. Down There was the affair in the Latin
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Speaker 1: Commons at Andover when Calhoun and I had put gunpowder
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Speaker 1: in the stove and nearly killed one of the masters.
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Speaker 1: And then, but what was the use? I was about
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Speaker 1: to die and atone for all these things, and several more.
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Speaker 1: Already the heat was sufficient to give me a foretaste
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Speaker 1: of the hereafter a few more degrees, and I felt
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Speaker 1: that I should lose consciousness. What are the readings now?
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Speaker 1: David Perry's voice broke in upon my somber reflections. Ninety
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Speaker 1: miles and one five three degrees, I replied, Gad, but
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Speaker 1: we've knocked that thirty mile crust theory into a cocked hat.
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Speaker 1: He cried, gleefully. Precious a lot of good it'll do us,
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Speaker 1: I growled back. But my boy, he continued, doesn't that
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Speaker 1: temperature reading mean anything to you? Why it hasn't gone
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Speaker 1: up in six miles? Think of it, Son, Yes, I'm
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Speaker 1: thinking of it, I answered, But what difference will it
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Speaker 1: make when our air supply is exhausted, whether the temperature
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Speaker 1: is one hundred fifty three degrees or one hundred and
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Speaker 1: fifty three thousand will be just as dead, and no
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Speaker 1: one will know the difference anyhow. But I must admit that,
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Speaker 1: for some unaccountable reason, the stationary temperature did renew my
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Speaker 1: waning hope. What I hoped for I could not have explained,
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Speaker 1: nor did I try. The very fact as Perry took
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Speaker 1: pains to explain of blasting, several very exact and learned
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Speaker 1: scientific hypotheses made it apparent that we could not know
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Speaker 1: what lay before us within the bowels of the earth,
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Speaker 1: and so we might continue to hope for the best,
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Speaker 1: at least until we were dead, when ho would no
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Speaker 1: longer be essential to our happiness. It was very good
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Speaker 1: and logical reasoning, and so I embraced it. At one
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Speaker 1: hundred miles the temperature had dropped to one hundred fifty
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Speaker 1: two and a half degrees. When I announced it, Perry
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Speaker 1: reached over and hugged me. From then on until noon
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Speaker 1: of the second day, it continued to drop until it
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Speaker 1: became as uncomfortably cold as it had been unbearably hot before.
15:28
Speaker 1: At the depth of two hundred and forty miles, our
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Speaker 1: nostrils were assailed by almost overpowering ammonia fumes, and the
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Speaker 1: temperature had dropped to ten below zero. We suffered nearly
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Speaker 1: two hours of this intense and bitter cold, until, at
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Speaker 1: about two hundred and forty five miles from the surface
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Speaker 1: of the earth, we entered a stratum of solid ice,
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Speaker 1: when the mercury quickly rose to thirty two degrees. During
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Speaker 1: the next three hours, we passed through ten miles of ice,
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Speaker 1: eventually emerging into another series of ammonia and pregnated strata,
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Speaker 1: where the mercury again fell to ten degrees below zero.
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Speaker 1: Slowly it rose once more, until we were convinced that
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Speaker 1: at last we were nearing the molten interior of the earth.
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Speaker 1: At four hundred miles, the temperature had reached one hundred
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Speaker 1: fifty three degrees. Feverishly, I watched the thermometer. Slowly it rose.
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Speaker 1: Perry had ceased singing, and was at last praying Our
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Speaker 1: hopes had received such a death blow that the gradually
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Speaker 1: increasing heat seemed to our distorted imaginations much greater than
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Speaker 1: it really was. For another hour, I saw that pitiless
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Speaker 1: column of mercury rise and rise, until at four hundred
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Speaker 1: and ten miles it stood at one hundred fifty three degrees.
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Speaker 1: Now it was that we began to hang upon those
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Speaker 1: readings in almost breathless anxiety. One hundred and fifty three
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Speaker 1: degrees had been the maximum temperature above the ice stratum.
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Speaker 1: Would it stop at this point again? Or would it
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Speaker 1: continue its merciless climb? We knew there was no hope,
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Speaker 1: and yet, with the persistence of life itself, we continued
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Speaker 1: to hope against practical certainty. Already the air tanks were
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Speaker 1: at low ebb. There was barely enough of the precious
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Speaker 1: gases to sustain us for another twelve hours. But would
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Speaker 1: we be alive to know or care? It seemed incredible.
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Speaker 1: At four hundred and twenty miles I took another reading. Parry,
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Speaker 1: I shouted, Parry, man, she's going down. She's going down.
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Speaker 1: It's one fifty two degrees again. Gad, he cried, What
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Speaker 1: can it mean? Can the earth be cold at this center?
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Speaker 1: I do not know, Perry, I answered, but thank God,
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Speaker 1: if I am to die, it shall not be by fire.
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Speaker 1: That is all I have feared. I can face the
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Speaker 1: thought of any death. But that down, down went the
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Speaker 1: mercury until it stood as low as it had seven
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Speaker 1: miles from the surface of the earth. And then of
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Speaker 1: a sudden realization broke upon us that death was very near.
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Speaker 1: Parry was the first to discover it. I saw him
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Speaker 1: fussing with the valves that regulated the air supply, and
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Speaker 1: at the same time I experienced difficulty in breathing. My
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Speaker 1: head felt dizzy, my limbs heavy. I saw Perry crumple
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Speaker 1: in his seat. He gave himself a shake and sat
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Speaker 1: erect again. Then he turned towards me. Good Bye, David,
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Speaker 1: he said, I guess this is the end, and then
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Speaker 1: he smiled and closed his eyes. Good Bye, Perry, and
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Speaker 1: good luck to you, I answered, smiling back at him.
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Speaker 1: But I fought off that awful lethargy. I was very young.
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Speaker 1: I did not want to die. For an hour, I
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Speaker 1: battled against the cruelly enveloping death that surrounded me upon
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Speaker 1: all sides. At first I found that by climbing high
18:38
Speaker 1: into the framework above me, I could find more of
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Speaker 1: the precious life giving elements, and for a while these
18:44
Speaker 1: sustained me. It must have been an hour after Perry
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Speaker 1: had succumbed that I at last came to the realization
18:50
Speaker 1: that I could no longer carry on this unequal struggle
18:53
Speaker 1: against the inevitable. With my last flickering ray of consciousness,
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Speaker 1: I turned mechanically towards the distance meter. It stood at
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Speaker 1: exactly five hundred miles from the Earth's surface. And then
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Speaker 1: of a sudden, the huge thing that bore us came
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Speaker 1: to a stop. The rattle of hurtling rock through the
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Speaker 1: hollow jacket ceased, the wild racing of the giant drill
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Speaker 1: betokened that it was running loose in air. And then
19:19
Speaker 1: another truth flashed upon me. The point of the Prospector
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Speaker 1: was above us. Slowly it dawned on me that since
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Speaker 1: passing through the ice strata, it had been above we
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Speaker 1: had turned on the ice and sped upwards towards the
19:33
Speaker 1: Earth's crust. Thank God, we were safe. I put my
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Speaker 1: nose to the intake pipe through which samples were to
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Speaker 1: have been taken during the passage of the Prospector through
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Speaker 1: the Earth, and my fondest hopes were realized. A flood
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Speaker 1: of fresh air was pouring into the iron cabin. The
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Speaker 1: reaction left me in a state of collapse and I
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Speaker 1: lost consciousness. End of chapter one,