“It’s an idea,” said Steevens, in the tone of one who keeps an open mind.
“I believe it will smash—flat,” said the lieutenant.
“But think of the pressure,” said the lieutenant. “At the surface of the water it’s fourteen pounds to the inch, thirty feet down it’s double that; sixty, treble; ninety, four times; nine hundred, forty times; five thousand three hundred—that’s a mile—it’s two hundred and forty times fourteen pounds; that’s—let’s see—thirty hundredweight—a ton and a half, Steevens; a ton and a half to the square inch. And the ocean where he’s going is five miles deep. That’s seven and a half—”
“Sounds a lot,” said Steevens, “but it’s jolly thick steel.”
The lieutenant made no answer, but resumed his pine splinter. The object of their conversation 158was a huge globe of steel, having an exterior5 diameter of perhaps eight feet. It looked like the shot for some Titanic6 piece of artillery7. It was elaborately nested in a monstrous8 scaffolding built into the framework of the vessel9, and the gigantic spars that were presently to sling10 it overboard gave the stern of the ship an appearance that had raised the curiosity of every decent sailor who had sighted it, from the pool of London to the Tropic of Capricorn. In two places, one above the other, the steel gave place to a couple of circular windows of enormously thick glass, and one of these, set in a steel frame of great solidity, was now partially11 unscrewed. Both the men had seen the interior of this globe for the first time that morning. It was elaborately padded with air cushions, with little studs sunk between bulging12 pillows to work the simple mechanism13 of the affair. Everything was elaborately padded, even the Myer’s apparatus14 which was to absorb carbonic acid and replace the oxygen inspired by its tenant2, when he had crept in by the glass manhole, and had been screwed in. It was so elaborately padded that a man might have been fired from a gun in it with perfect safety. And it had need to be, for presently a man was to crawl in through that glass manhole, to be screwed up tightly, and to be flung overboard, and to sink down—down—down, for five miles, even as the lieutenant said. It had taken the strongest hold of his imagination; it made him a bore at 159mess; and he found Steevens, the new arrival aboard, a godsend to talk to about it, over and over again.
“It’s my opinion,” said the lieutenant, “that that glass will simply bend in and bulge15 and smash, under a pressure of that sort. Daubrée has made rocks run like water under big pressures—and, you mark my words—”
“If the glass did break in,” said Steevens, “what then?”
“The water would shoot in like a jet of iron. Have you ever felt a straight jet of high pressure water? It would hit as hard as a bullet. It would simply smash him and flatten16 him. It would tear down his throat, and into his lungs; it would blow in his ears—”
“It’s a simple statement of the inevitable,” said the lieutenant.
“And the globe?”
“Would just give out a few little bubbles, and it would settle down, comfortably against the day of judgment19, among the oozes21 and the bottom clay—with poor Elstead spread over his own smashed cushions like butter over bread.”
He repeated this sentence as though he liked it very much. “Like butter over bread,” he said.
“Having a look at the jigger?” said a voice behind them, and Elstead stood behind them, 160spick and span in white, with a cigarette between his teeth, and his eyes smiling out of the shadow of his ample hat-brim. “What’s that about bread and butter, Weybridge? Grumbling22 as usual about the insufficient23 pay of naval24 officers? It won’t be more than a day now before I start. We are to get the slings26 ready to-day. This clean sky and gentle swell27 is just the kind of thing for swinging off twenty tons of lead and iron; isn’t it?”
“It won’t affect you much,” said Weybridge.
“No. Seventy or eighty feet down, and I shall be there in a dozen seconds, there’s not a particle moving, though the wind shriek29 itself hoarse30 up above, and the water lifts halfway31 to the clouds. No. Down there—.” He moved to the side of the ship and the other two followed him. All three leant forward on their elbows and stared down into the yellow-green water.
“Peace,” said Elstead, finishing his thought aloud.
“Are you dead certain that clockwork will act?” asked Weybridge, presently.
“It has worked thirty-five times,” said Elstead. “It’s bound to work.”
“But if it doesn’t?”
“Why shouldn’t it?”
“I wouldn’t go down in that confounded thing,” said Weybridge, “for twenty thousand pounds.”
161“I don’t understand yet how you mean to work the thing,” said Steevens.
“In the first place I’m screwed into the sphere,” said Elstead, “and when I’ve turned the electric light off and on three times to show I’m cheerful, I’m swung out over the stern by that crane, with all those big lead sinkers slung34 below me. The top lead weight has a roller carrying a hundred fathoms35 of strong cord rolled up, and that’s all that joins the sinkers to the sphere, except the slings that will be cut when the affair is dropped. We use cord rather than wire rope because it’s easier to cut and more buoyant—necessary points as you will see.
“Through each of these lead weights you notice there is a hole, and an iron rod will be run through that and will project six feet on the lower side. If that rod is rammed36 up from below it knocks up a lever and sets the clockwork in motion at the side of the cylinder37 on which the cord winds.
“Very well. The whole affair is lowered gently into the water, and the slings are cut. The sphere floats—with the air in it, it’s lighter38 than water; but the lead weights go down straight and the cord runs out. When the cord is all paid out, the sphere will go down too, pulled down by the cord.”
“But why the cord?” asked Steevens. “Why not fasten the weights directly to the sphere?”
“Because of the smash down below. The 162whole affair will go rushing down, mile after mile, at a headlong pace at last. It would be knocked to pieces on the bottom if it wasn’t for that cord. But the weights will hit the bottom, and directly they do the buoyancy of the sphere will come into play. It will go on sinking slower and slower; come to a stop at last and then begin to float upward again.
“That’s where the clockwork comes in. Directly the weights smash against the sea bottom, the rod will be knocked through and will kick up the clockwork, and the cord will be rewound on the reel. I shall be lugged39 down to the sea bottom. There I shall stay for half an hour, with the electric light on, looking about me. Then the clockwork will release a spring knife, the cord will be cut, and up I shall rush again, like a soda-water bubble. The cord itself will help the flotation.”
“And if you should chance to hit a ship?” said Weybridge.
“I should come up at such a pace, I should go clean through it,” said Elstead, “like a cannon40 ball. You needn’t worry about that.”
“It would be a pressing sort of invitation for me to stop,” said Elstead, turning his back on the water and staring at the sphere.
They had swung Elstead overboard by eleven 163o’clock. The day was serenely43 bright and calm, with the horizon lost in haze44. The electric glare in the little upper compartment45 beamed cheerfully three times. Then they let him down slowly to the surface of the water, and a sailor in the stern chains hung ready to cut the tackle that held the lead weights and the sphere together. The globe, which had looked so large on deck, looked the smallest thing conceivable under the stern of the ship. It rolled a little, and its two dark windows, which floated uppermost, seemed like eyes turned up in round wonderment at the people who crowded the rail. A voice wondered how Elstead liked the rolling. “Are you ready?” sang out the Commander. “Aye, aye, sir!” “Then let her go!”
The rope of the tackle tightened46 against the blade and was cut, and an eddy47 rolled over the globe in a grotesquely48 helpless fashion. Some one waved a handkerchief, some one else tried an ineffectual cheer, a middy was counting slowly: “Eight, nine, ten!” Another roll, then with a jerk and a splash the thing righted itself.
It seemed to be stationary49 for a moment, to grow rapidly smaller, and then the water closed over it, and it became visible, enlarged by refraction and dimmer, below the surface. Before one could count three it had disappeared. There was a flicker50 of white light far down in the water, that diminished to a speck51 and vanished. Then there 164was nothing but a depth of water going down into blackness, through which a shark was swimming.
Then suddenly the screw of the cruiser began to rotate, the water was crickled, the shark disappeared in a wrinkled confusion, and a torrent52 of foam53 rushed across the crystalline clearness that had swallowed up Elstead. “What’s the idee?” said one A. B. to another.
“We’re going to lay off about a couple of miles, ’fear he should hit us when he comes up,” said his mate.
The ship steamed slowly to her new position. Aboard her almost every one who was unoccupied remained watching the breathing swell into which the sphere had sunk. For the next half hour it is doubtful if a word was spoken that did not bear directly or indirectly55 on Elstead. The December sun was now high in the sky, and the heat very considerable.
“He’ll be cold enough down there,” said Weybridge. “They say that below a certain depth sea-water’s always just about freezing.”
“Where’ll he come up?” asked Steevens. “I’ve lost my bearings.”
“That’s the spot,” said the Commander, who prided himself on his omniscience56. He extended a precise finger south-eastward. “And this, I reckon, is pretty nearly the moment,” he said. “He’s been thirty-five minutes.”
165“How long does it take to reach the bottom of the ocean?” asked Steevens.
“For a depth of five miles, and reckoning—as we did—an acceleration57 to two foot per second, both ways, is just about three-quarters of a minute.”
“Then he’s overdue,” said Weybridge.
“Pretty nearly,” said the Commander. “I suppose it takes a few minutes for that cord of his to wind in.”
“I forgot that,” said Weybridge, evidently relieved.
And then began the suspense58. A minute slowly dragged itself out, and no sphere shot out of the water. Another followed, and nothing broke the low oily swell. The sailors explained to one another that little point about the winding-in of the cord. The rigging was dotted with expectant faces. “Come up, Elstead!” called one hairy-chested salt, impatiently, and the others caught it up, and shouted as though they were waiting for the curtain of a theatre to rise.
“Of course, if the acceleration’s less than two,” he said, “he’ll be all the longer. We aren’t absolutely certain that was the proper figure. I’m no slavish believer in calculations.”
Steevens agreed concisely60. No one on the quarter-deck spoke54 for a couple of minutes. Then Steevens’s watch-case clicked.
When, twenty-one minutes after, the sun reached 166the zenith, they were still waiting for the globe to reappear, and not a man aboard had dared to whisper that hope was dead. It was Weybridge who first gave expression to that realisation. He spoke while the sound of eight bells still hung in the air. “I always distrusted that window,” he said quite suddenly to Steevens.
“Good God!” said Steevens, “you don’t think—”
“Well!” said Weybridge, and left the rest to his imagination.
“I’m no great believer in calculations myself,” said the Commander, dubiously61, “so that I’m not altogether hopeless yet.” And at midnight the gunboat was steaming slowly in a spiral round the spot where the globe had sunk, and the white beam of the electric light fled and halted and swept discontentedly onward62 again over the waste of phosphorescent waters under the little stars.
“If his window hasn’t burst and smashed him,” said Weybridge, “then it’s a cursed sight worse, for his clockwork has gone wrong and he’s alive now, five miles under our feet, down there in the cold and dark, anchored in that little bubble of his, where never a ray of light has shone or a human being lived, since the waters were gathered together. He’s there without food, feeling hungry and thirsty and scared, wondering whether he’ll starve or stifle63. Which will it be? The Myer’s apparatus is running out, I suppose. How long do they last?
167“Good Heavens!” he exclaimed, “what little things we are! What daring little devils! Down there, miles and miles of water—all water, and all this empty water about us and this sky. Gulfs!” He threw his hands out, and as he did so a little white streak64 swept noiselessly up the sky, travelling more slowly, stopped, became a motionless dot as though a new star had fallen up into the sky. Then it went sliding back again and lost itself amidst the reflections of the stars, and the white haze of the sea’s phosphorescence.
At the sight he stopped, arm extended and mouth open. He shut his mouth, opened it again and waved his arms with an impatient gesture. Then he turned, shouted, “Elstead ahoy,” to the first watch, and went at a run to Lindley and the search light. “I saw him,” he said. “Starboard there! His light’s on and he’s just shot out of the water. Bring the light round. We ought to see him drifting, when he lifts on the swell.”
But they never picked up the explorer until dawn. Then they almost ran him down. The crane was swung out and a boat’s crew hooked the chain to the sphere. When they had shipped the sphere they unscrewed the manhole and peered into the darkness of the interior (for the electric light chamber65 was intended to illuminate66 the water about the sphere, and was shut off entirely67 from its general cavity).
168The air was very hot within the cavity, and the india-rubber at the lip of the manhole was soft. There was no answer to their eager questions and no sound of movement within. Elstead seemed to be lying motionless, crumpled68 up in the bottom of the globe. The ship’s doctor crawled in and lifted him out to the men outside. For a moment or so they did not know whether Elstead was alive or dead. His face, in the yellow glow of the ship’s lamps, glistened69 with perspiration70. They carried him down to his own cabin.
He was not dead they found, but in a state of absolute nervous collapse71, and besides cruelly bruised72. For some days he had to lie perfectly73 still. It was a week before he could tell his experiences.
Almost his first words were that he was going down again. The sphere would have to be altered, he said, in order to allow him to throw off the cord if need be, and that was all. He had had the most marvellous experience. “You thought I should find nothing but ooze20,” he said. “You laughed at my explorations, and I’ve discovered a new world!” He told his story in disconnected fragments, and chiefly from the wrong end, so that it is impossible to re-tell it in his words. But what follows is the narrative74 of his experience.
It began atrociously, he said. Before the cord ran out the thing kept rolling over. He felt like 169a frog in a football. He could see nothing but the crane and the sky overhead, with an occasional glimpse of the people on the ship’s rail. He couldn’t tell a bit which way the thing would roll next. Suddenly he would find his feet going up and try to step, and over he went rolling, head over heels and just anyhow on the padding. Any other shape would have been more comfortable, but no other shape was to be relied upon under the huge pressure of the nethermost75 abyss.
Suddenly the swaying ceased; the globe righted, and when he had picked himself up, he saw the water all about him greeny-blue with an attenuated76 light filtering down from above, and a shoal of little floating things went rushing up past him, as it seemed to him, towards the light. And even as he looked it grew darker and darker, until the water above was as dark as the midnight sky, albeit77 of a greener shade, and the water below black. And little transparent78 things in the water developed a faint glint of luminosity, and shot past him in faint greenish streaks79.
And the feeling of falling! It was just like the start of a lift, he said, only it kept on. One has to imagine what that means, that keeping on. It was then of all times that Elstead repented80 of his adventure. He saw the chances against him in an altogether new light. He thought of the big cuttle-fish people knew to exist in the middle waters, the kind of things they find half-digested 170in whales at times, or floating dead and rotten and half eaten by fish. Suppose one caught hold and wouldn’t leave go. And had the clockwork really been sufficiently81 tested? But whether he wanted to go on or go back mattered not the slightest now.
In fifty seconds everything was as black as night outside, except where the beam from his light struck through the waters, and picked out every now and then some fish or scrap82 of sinking matter. They flashed by too fast for him to see what they were. Once he thought he passed a shark. And then the sphere began to get hot by friction83 against the water. They had underestimated this, it seems.
The first thing he noticed was that he was perspiring84, and then he heard a hissing85, growing louder, under his feet, and saw a lot of little bubbles—very little bubbles they were—rushing upward like a fan through the water outside. Steam! He felt the window and it was hot. He turned on the minute glow lamp that lit his own cavity, looked at the padded watch by the studs, and saw he had been travelling now for two minutes. It came into his head that the window would crack through the conflict of temperatures, for he knew the bottom water was very near freezing.
Then suddenly the floor of the sphere seemed to press against his feet, the rush of bubbles outside 171grew slower and slower and the hissing diminished. The sphere rolled a little. The window had not cracked, nothing had given, and he knew that the dangers of sinking, at any rate, were over.
In another minute or so, he would be on the floor of the abyss. He thought, he said, of Steevens and Weybridge and the rest of them five miles overhead, higher to him than the very highest clouds that ever floated over land are to us, steaming slowly and staring down and wondering what had happened to him.
He peered out of the window. There were no more bubbles now, and the hissing had stopped. Outside there was a heavy blackness—as black as black velvet—except where the electric light pierced the empty water and showed the colour of it—a yellow-green. Then three things like shapes of fire swam into sight, following each other through the water. Whether they were little and near, or big and far off, he could not tell.
Each was outlined in a bluish light almost as bright as the lights of a fishing-smack, a light which seemed to be smoking greatly, and all along the sides of them were specks86 of this, like the lighted portholes of a ship. Their phosphorescence seemed to go out as they came into the radiance of his lamp, and he saw then that they were indeed fish of some strange sort, with 172huge heads, vast eyes, and dwindling87 bodies and tails. Their eyes were turned towards him, and he judged they were following him down. He supposed they were attracted by his glare.
Presently others of the same sort joined them. As he went on down he noticed that the water became of a pallid88 colour, and that little specks twinkled in his ray like motes89 in sunbeam. This was probably due to the clouds of ooze and mud that the impact of his leaden sinkers had disturbed.
By the time he was drawn90 down to the lead weights he was in a dense91 fog of white that his electric light failed altogether to pierce for more than a few yards, and many minutes elapsed before the hanging sheets of sediment92 subsided93 to any extent. Then, lit by his light and by the transient phosphorescence of a distant shoal of fishes, he was able to see under the huge blackness of the super-incumbent water an undulating expanse of greyish-white ooze, broken here and there by tangled94 thickets95 of a growth of sea lilies, waving hungry tentacles96 in the air.
Farther away were the graceful97 translucent98 outlines of a group of gigantic sponges. About this floor there were scattered99 a number of bristling100 flattish tufts of rich purple and black, which he decided101 must be some sort of sea-urchin, and small, large-eyed or blind things, having a curious resemblance, some to woodlice, and others to 173lobsters, crawled sluggishly102 across the track of the light and vanished into the obscurity again, leaving furrowed103 trails behind them.
Then suddenly the hovering104 swarm105 of little fishes veered106 about and came towards him as a flight of starlings might do. They passed over him like a phosphorescent snow, and then he saw behind them some larger creature advancing towards the sphere.
At first he could see it only dimly, a faintly moving figure remotely suggestive of a walking man, and then it came into the spray of light that the lamp shot out. As the glare struck it, it shut its eyes, dazzled. He stared in rigid107 astonishment108.
It was a strange, vertebrated animal. Its dark purple head was dimly suggestive of a chameleon109, but it had such a high forehead and such a brain-case as no reptile110 ever displayed before; the vertical111 pitch of its face gave it a most extraordinary resemblance to a human being.
Two large and protruding112 eyes projected from sockets113 in chameleon fashion, and it had a broad reptilian114 mouth with horny lips beneath its little nostrils115. In the position of the ears were two huge gill covers, and out of these floated a branching tree of coralline filaments116, almost like the tree-like gills that very young rays and sharks possess.
But the humanity of the face was not the most 174extraordinary thing about the creature. It was a biped, its almost globular body was poised117 on a tripod of two frog-like legs and a long thick tail, and its fore25 limbs, which grotesquely caricatured the human hand much as a frog’s do, carried a long shaft118 of bone, tipped with copper119. The colour of the creature was variegated120: its head, hands, and legs were purple; but its skin, which hung loosely upon it, even as clothes might do, was a phosphorescent grey. And it stood there, blinded by the light.
At last this unknown creature of the abyss blinked its eyes open, and, shading them with its disengaged hand, opened its mouth and gave vent28 to a shouting noise, articulate almost as speech might be, that penetrated121 even the steel case and padded jacket of the sphere. How a shouting may be accomplished122 without lungs Elstead does not profess123 to explain. It then moved sideways out of the glare into the mystery of shadow that bordered it on either side, and Elstead felt rather than saw that it was coming towards him. Fancying the light had attracted it, he turned the switch that cut off the current. In another moment something soft dabbed124 upon the steel, and the globe swayed.
Then the shouting was repeated, and it seemed to him that a distant echo answered it. The dabbing125 recurred126, and the globe swayed and ground against the spindle over which the wire 175was rolled. He stood in the blackness, and peered out into the everlasting127 night of the abyss. And presently he saw, very faint and remote, other phosphorescent quasi-human forms hurrying towards him.
Hardly knowing what he did, he felt about in his swaying prison for the stud of the exterior electric light, and came by accident against his own small glow lamp in its padded recess128. The sphere twisted, and then threw him down; he heard shouts like shouts of surprise, and when he rose to his feet he saw two pairs of stalked eyes peering into the lower window and reflecting his light.
In another moment hands were dabbing vigorously at his steel casing, and there was a sound, horrible enough in his position, of the metal protection of the clockwork being vigorously hammered. That, indeed, sent his heart into his mouth, for if these strange creatures succeeded in stopping that his release would never occur. Scarcely had he thought as much when he felt the sphere sway violently, and the floor of it press hard against his feet. He turned off the small glow lamp that lit the interior, and sent the ray of the large light in the separate compartment out into the water. The sea floor and the manlike creatures had disappeared, and a couple of fish chasing each other dropped suddenly by the window.
176He thought at once that these strange denizens129 of the deep sea had broken the wire rope, and that he had escaped. He drove up faster and faster, and then stopped with a jerk that sent him flying against the padded roof of his prison. For half a minute perhaps he was too astonished to think.
Then he felt that the sphere was spinning slowly, and rocking, and it seemed to him that it was also being drawn through the water. By crouching130 close to the window he managed to make his weight effective and roll that part of the sphere downward, but he could see nothing save the pale ray of his light striking down ineffectively into the darkness. It occurred to him that he would see more if he turned the lamp off and allowed his eyes to grow accustomed to the profound obscurity.
In this he was wise. After some minutes the velvety131 blackness became a translucent blackness, and then far away, and as faint as the zodiacal light of an English summer evening, he saw shapes moving below. He judged these creatures had detached his cable and were towing him along the sea bottom.
And then he saw something faint and remote across the undulations of the submarine plain, a broad horizon of pale luminosity that extended this way and that way as far as the range of his little window permitted him to see. To this he 177was being towed, as a balloon might be towed by men out of the open country into a town. He approached it very slowly, and very slowly the dim irradiation was gathered together into more definite shapes.
It was nearly five o’clock before he came over this luminous132 area, and by that time he could make out an arrangement suggestive of streets and houses grouped about a vast roofless erection that was grotesquely suggestive of a ruined abbey. It was spread out like a map below him. The houses were all roofless inclosures of walls, and their substance being, as he afterwards saw, of phosphorescent bones, gave the place an appearance as if it were built of drowned moonshine.
Among the inner caves of the place waving trees of crinoid stretched their tentacles, and tall, slender, glassy sponges shot like shining minarets133 and lilies of filmy light out of the general glow of the city. In the open spaces of the place he could see a stirring movement as of crowds of people, but he was too many fathoms above them to distinguish the individuals in those crowds.
Then slowly they pulled him down, and as they did so the details of the place crept slowly upon his apprehension134. He saw that the courses of the cloudy buildings were marked out with beaded lines of round objects, and then he perceived 178that at several points below him in broad open spaces were forms like the encrusted shapes of ships.
Slowly and surely he was drawn down, and the forms below him became brighter, clearer, were more distinct. He was being pulled down, he perceived, towards the large building in the centre of the town, and he could catch a glimpse ever and again of the multitudinous forms that were lugging135 at his cord. He was astonished to see that the rigging of one of the ships, which formed such a prominent feature of the place, was crowded with a host of gesticulating figures regarding him, and then the walls of the great building rose about him silently, and hid the city from his eyes.
And such walls they were, of water-logged wood, and twisted wire rope and iron spars, and copper, and the bones and skulls136 of dead men.
The skulls ran in curious zigzag137 lines and spirals and fantastic curves over the building; and in and out of their eye-sockets, and over the whole surface of the place, lurked138 and played a multitude of silvery little fishes.
And now he was at such a level that he could see these strange people of the abyss plainly once more. To his astonishment, he perceived that they were prostrating139 themselves before him, all save one, dressed as it seemed in a robe of 179placoid scales, and crowned with a luminous diadem140, who stood with his reptilian mouth opening and shutting as though he led the chanting of the worshippers.
They continued worshipping him, without rest or intermission, for the space of three hours.
Most circumstantial was Elstead’s account of this astounding141 city and its people, these people of perpetual night, who have never seen sun or moon or stars, green vegetation, nor any living air-breathing creatures, who know nothing of fire, nor any light but the phosphorescent light of living things.
Startling as is his story, it is yet more startling to find that scientific men, of such eminence142 as Adams and Jenkins, find nothing incredible in it. They tell me they see no reason why intelligent, water-breathing, vertebrated creatures inured143 to a low temperature and enormous pressure, and of such a heavy structure, that neither alive nor dead would they float, might not live upon the bottom of the deep sea, and quite unsuspected by us, descendants like ourselves of the great Theriomorpha of the New Red Sandstone age.
We should be known to them, however, as strange meteoric144 creatures wont145 to fall catastrophically dead out of the mysterious blackness of their watery146 sky. And not only we ourselves, but our ships, our metals, our appliances, would come raining down out of the night. Sometimes 180sinking things would smite147 down and crush them, as if it were the judgment of some unseen power above, and sometimes would come things of the utmost rarity or utility or shapes of inspiring suggestion. One can understand, perhaps, something of their behaviour at the descent of a living man, if one thinks what a barbaric people might do, to whom an enhaloed shining creature came suddenly out of the sky.
At one time or another Elstead probably told the officers of the Ptarmigan every detail of his strange twelve hours in the abyss. That he also intended to write them down is certain, but he never did, and so unhappily we have to piece together the discrepant148 fragments of his story from the reminiscences of Commander Simmons, Weybridge, Steevens, Lindley, and the others.
We see the thing darkly in fragmentary glimpses—the huge ghostly building, the bowing, chanting people, with their dark, chameleon-like heads and faintly luminous forms, and Elstead, with his light turned on again, vainly trying to convey to their minds that the cord by which the sphere was held was to be severed149. Minute after minute slipped away, and Elstead, looking at his watch, was horrified150 to find that he had oxygen only for four hours more. But the chant in his honour kept on as remorselessly as if it was the marching song of his approaching death.
The manner of his release he does not understand, 181but to judge by the end of cord that hung from the sphere, it had been cut through by rubbing against the edge of the altar. Abruptly151 the sphere rolled over, and he swept up, out of their world, as an ethereal creature clothed in a vacuum would sweep through our own atmosphere back to its native ether again. He must have torn out of their sight as a hydrogen bubble hastens upwards152 from our air. A strange ascension it must have seemed to them.
The sphere rushed up with even greater velocity153 than, when weighed with the lead sinkers, it had rushed down. It became exceedingly hot. It drove up with the windows uppermost, and he remembers the torrent of bubbles frothing against the glass. Every moment he expected this to fly. Then suddenly something like a huge wheel seemed to be released in his head, the padded compartment began spinning about him, and he fainted. His next recollection was of his cabin, and of the doctor’s voice.
But that is the substance of the extraordinary story that Elstead related in fragments to the officers of the Ptarmigan. He promised to write it all down at a later date. His mind was chiefly occupied with the improvement of his apparatus, which was effected at Rio.
It remains154 only to tell that on February 2d, 1896, he made his second descent into the ocean abyss, with the improvements his first experience 182suggested. What happened we shall probably never know. He never returned. The Ptarmigan beat about over the point of his submersion, seeking him in vain for thirteen days. Then she returned to Rio, and the news was telegraphed to his friends. So the matter remains for the present. But it is hardly probable that any further attempt will be made to verify his strange story of these hitherto unsuspected cities of the deep sea.
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lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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tenant
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| n.承租人；房客；佃户；v.租借，租用 | |
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3
gnawed
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| 咬( gnaw的过去式和过去分词 )； （长时间） 折磨某人； （使）苦恼； （长时间）危害某事物 | |
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4
impartial
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| adj.(in,to)公正的，无偏见的 | |
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5
exterior
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| adj.外部的，外在的；表面的 | |
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6
titanic
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| adj.巨人的，庞大的，强大的 | |
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7
artillery
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| n.(军)火炮，大炮；炮兵(部队) | |
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8
monstrous
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| adj.巨大的；恐怖的；可耻的，丢脸的 | |
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9
vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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10
sling
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| vt.扔；悬挂；n.挂带；吊索，吊兜；弹弓 | |
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11
partially
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| adv.部分地，从某些方面讲 | |
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12
bulging
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| 膨胀； 凸出（部）； 打气； 折皱 | |
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13
mechanism
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| n.机械装置；机构，结构 | |
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14
apparatus
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| n.装置，器械；器具，设备 | |
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15
bulge
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| n.突出，膨胀，激增；vt.突出，膨胀 | |
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16
flatten
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| v.把．．．弄平，使倒伏；使(漆等)失去光泽 | |
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17
detailed
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| adj.详细的，详尽的，极注意细节的，完全的 | |
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18
vividly
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| adv.清楚地，鲜明地，生动地 | |
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19
judgment
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| n.审判；判断力，识别力，看法，意见 | |
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20
ooze
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| n.软泥，渗出物；vi.渗出，泄漏；vt.慢慢渗出，流露 | |
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21
oozes
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| v.（浓液等）慢慢地冒出，渗出( ooze的第三人称单数 )；使（液体）缓缓流出；（浓液）渗出，慢慢流出 | |
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22
grumbling
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| adj. 喃喃鸣不平的, 出怨言的 | |
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23
insufficient
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| adj.(for，of)不足的，不够的 | |
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24
naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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25
fore
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| adv.在前面；adj.先前的；在前部的；n.前部 | |
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26
slings
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| 抛( sling的第三人称单数 )； 吊挂； 遣送； 押往 | |
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27
swell
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| vi.膨胀，肿胀；增长，增强 | |
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28
vent
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| n.通风口，排放口；开衩；vt.表达，发泄 | |
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29
shriek
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| v./n.尖叫，叫喊 | |
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30
hoarse
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| adj.嘶哑的，沙哑的 | |
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31
halfway
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| adj.中途的，不彻底的，部分的；adv.半路地，在中途，在半途 | |
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32
spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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33
sociably
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| adv.成群地 | |
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34
slung
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| 抛( sling的过去式和过去分词 )； 吊挂； 遣送； 押往 | |
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35
fathoms
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| 英寻( fathom的名词复数 ) | |
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36
rammed
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| v.夯实（土等）( ram的过去式和过去分词 )；猛撞；猛压；反复灌输 | |
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37
cylinder
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| n.圆筒，柱(面)，汽缸 | |
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38
lighter
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| n.打火机，点火器；驳船；v.用驳船运送；light的比较级 | |
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39
lugged
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| vt.用力拖拉（lug的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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40
cannon
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| n.大炮，火炮；飞机上的机关炮 | |
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41
crustacean
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| n.甲壳动物；adj.甲壳纲的 | |
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42
wriggle
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| v./n.蠕动，扭动；蜿蜒 | |
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43
serenely
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| adv.安详地，宁静地，平静地 | |
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44
haze
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| n.霾，烟雾；懵懂，迷糊；vi.(over)变模糊 | |
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45
compartment
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| n.卧车包房，隔间；分隔的空间 | |
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46
tightened
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| 收紧( tighten的过去式和过去分词 )； （使）变紧； （使）绷紧； 加紧 | |
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47
eddy
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| n.漩涡，涡流 | |
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48
grotesquely
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| adv. 奇异地,荒诞地 | |
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49
stationary
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| adj.固定的，静止不动的 | |
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50
flicker
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| vi./n.闪烁，摇曳，闪现 | |
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51
speck
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| n.微粒，小污点，小斑点 | |
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52
torrent
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| n.激流，洪流；爆发，(话语等的)连发 | |
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53
foam
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| v./n.泡沫，起泡沫 | |
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54
spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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55
indirectly
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| adv.间接地，不直接了当地 | |
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56
omniscience
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| n.全知，全知者，上帝 | |
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57
acceleration
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| n.加速，加速度 | |
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58
suspense
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| n.（对可能发生的事）紧张感，担心，挂虑 | |
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59
irritably
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| ad.易生气地 | |
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60
concisely
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| adv.简明地 | |
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61
dubiously
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| adv.可疑地，怀疑地 | |
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62
onward
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|
| adj.向前的，前进的；adv.向前，前进，在先 | |
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63
stifle
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| vt.使窒息；闷死；扼杀；抑止，阻止 | |
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64
streak
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| n.条理，斑纹，倾向，少许，痕迹；v.加条纹，变成条纹，奔驰，快速移动 | |
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65
chamber
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| n.房间，寝室；会议厅；议院；会所 | |
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66
illuminate
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| vt.照亮，照明；用灯光装饰；说明，阐释 | |
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67
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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68
crumpled
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| adj. 弯扭的, 变皱的 动词crumple的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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69
glistened
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| v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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70
perspiration
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| n.汗水；出汗 | |
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71
collapse
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| vi.累倒；昏倒；倒塌；塌陷 | |
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72
bruised
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| [医]青肿的，瘀紫的 | |
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73
perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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74
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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75
nethermost
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| adj.最下面的 | |
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76
attenuated
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| v.（使）变细( attenuate的过去式和过去分词 )；（使）变薄；（使）变小；减弱 | |
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77
albeit
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| conj.即使；纵使；虽然 | |
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78
transparent
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| adj.明显的，无疑的；透明的 | |
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79
streaks
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| n.（与周围有所不同的）条纹( streak的名词复数 )；（通常指不好的）特征（倾向）；（不断经历成功或失败的）一段时期v.快速移动( streak的第三人称单数 )；使布满条纹 | |
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80
repented
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| 对（自己的所为）感到懊悔或忏悔( repent的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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81
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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82
scrap
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| n.碎片；废料；v.废弃，报废 | |
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83
friction
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| n.摩擦，摩擦力 | |
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84
perspiring
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| v.出汗，流汗( perspire的现在分词 ) | |
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85
hissing
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| n. 发嘶嘶声, 蔑视 动词hiss的现在分词形式 | |
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86
specks
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| n.眼镜；斑点，微粒，污点( speck的名词复数 ) | |
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87
dwindling
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| adj.逐渐减少的v.逐渐变少或变小( dwindle的现在分词 ) | |
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88
pallid
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| adj.苍白的，呆板的 | |
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89
motes
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| n.尘埃( mote的名词复数 )；斑点 | |
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90
drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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91
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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92
sediment
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| n.沉淀，沉渣，沉积(物) | |
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93
subsided
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| v.（土地）下陷（因在地下采矿）( subside的过去式和过去分词 )；减弱；下降至较低或正常水平；一下子坐在椅子等上 | |
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94
tangled
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| adj. 纠缠的，紊乱的 动词tangle的过去式和过去分词 | |
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95
thickets
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| n.灌木丛( thicket的名词复数 )；丛状物 | |
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96
tentacles
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| n.触手( tentacle的名词复数 )；触角；触须；触毛 | |
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97
graceful
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| adj.优美的，优雅的；得体的 | |
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98
translucent
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| adj.半透明的；透明的 | |
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99
scattered
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| adj.分散的，稀疏的；散步的；疏疏落落的 | |
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100
bristling
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| a.竖立的 | |
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101
decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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102
sluggishly
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| adv.懒惰地；缓慢地 | |
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103
furrowed
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| v.犁田，开沟( furrow的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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104
hovering
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| 鸟( hover的现在分词 )； 靠近（某事物）； （人）徘徊； 犹豫 | |
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105
swarm
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| n.(昆虫)等一大群；vi.成群飞舞；蜂拥而入 | |
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106
veered
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| v.（尤指交通工具）改变方向或路线( veer的过去式和过去分词 )；（指谈话内容、人的行为或观点）突然改变；（指风） （在北半球按顺时针方向、在南半球按逆时针方向）逐渐转向；风向顺时针转 | |
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107
rigid
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| adj.严格的，死板的；刚硬的，僵硬的 | |
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108
astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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109
chameleon
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| n.变色龙，蜥蜴；善变之人 | |
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110
reptile
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| n.爬行动物；两栖动物 | |
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111
vertical
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| adj.垂直的，顶点的，纵向的；n.垂直物，垂直的位置 | |
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112
protruding
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| v.（使某物）伸出，（使某物）突出( protrude的现在分词 )；凸 | |
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113
sockets
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| n.套接字，使应用程序能够读写与收发通讯协定(protocol)与资料的程序( Socket的名词复数 )；孔( socket的名词复数 )；（电器上的）插口；托座；凹穴 | |
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114
reptilian
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| adj.（像）爬行动物的；（像）爬虫的；卑躬屈节的；卑鄙的n.两栖动物；卑劣的人 | |
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115
nostrils
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| 鼻孔( nostril的名词复数 ) | |
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116
filaments
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| n.（电灯泡的）灯丝( filament的名词复数 )；丝极；细丝；丝状物 | |
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117
poised
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| a.摆好姿势不动的 | |
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118
shaft
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| n.(工具的)柄，杆状物 | |
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119
copper
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| n.铜；铜币；铜器；adj.铜(制)的；(紫)铜色的 | |
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120
variegated
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| adj.斑驳的，杂色的 | |
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121
penetrated
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| adj. 击穿的，鞭辟入里的 动词penetrate的过去式和过去分词形式 | |
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122
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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123
profess
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| v.声称，冒称，以...为业，正式接受入教，表明信仰 | |
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124
dabbed
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| （用某物）轻触( dab的过去式和过去分词 )； 轻而快地擦掉（或抹掉）； 快速擦拭； （用某物）轻而快地涂上（或点上）… | |
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125
dabbing
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| 石面凿毛，灰泥抛毛 | |
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126
recurred
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| 再发生，复发( recur的过去式和过去分词 )； 治愈 | |
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127
everlasting
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| adj.永恒的，持久的，无止境的 | |
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128
recess
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| n.短期休息，壁凹（墙上装架子，柜子等凹处） | |
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129
denizens
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| n.居民，住户( denizen的名词复数 ) | |
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crouching
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的现在分词 ) | |
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velvety
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| adj. 像天鹅绒的, 轻软光滑的, 柔软的 | |
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luminous
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| adj.发光的，发亮的；光明的；明白易懂的；有启发的 | |
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133
minarets
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| n.（清真寺旁由报告祈祷时刻的人使用的）光塔( minaret的名词复数 ) | |
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134
apprehension
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| n.理解，领悟；逮捕，拘捕；忧虑 | |
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135
lugging
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| 超载运转能力 | |
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136
skulls
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| 颅骨( skull的名词复数 )； 脑袋； 脑子； 脑瓜 | |
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zigzag
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| n.曲折，之字形；adj.曲折的，锯齿形的；adv.曲折地，成锯齿形地；vt.使曲折；vi.曲折前行 | |
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138
lurked
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| vi.潜伏，埋伏（lurk的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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139
prostrating
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| v.使俯伏，使拜倒( prostrate的现在分词 )；（指疾病、天气等）使某人无能为力 | |
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140
diadem
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| n.王冠，冕 | |
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141
astounding
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| adj.使人震惊的vt.使震惊，使大吃一惊astound的现在分词) | |
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142
eminence
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| n.卓越，显赫；高地，高处；名家 | |
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143
inured
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| adj.坚强的，习惯的 | |
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144
meteoric
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| adj.流星的，转瞬即逝的，突然的 | |
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wont
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| adj.习惯于；v.习惯；n.习惯 | |
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146
watery
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| adj.有水的，水汪汪的；湿的，湿润的 | |
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smite
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| v.重击；彻底击败；n.打；尝试；一点儿 | |
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discrepant
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| 差异的 | |
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severed
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| v.切断，断绝( sever的过去式和过去分词 )；断，裂 | |
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horrified
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| a.(表现出)恐惧的 | |
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151
abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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152
upwards
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| adv.向上，在更高处...以上 | |
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153
velocity
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| n.速度，速率 | |
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remains
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| n.剩余物，残留物；遗体，遗迹 | |
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