I was like a many who, having been round the world, finds himself wholly blase1 and proof against the marvelous.
When, however, I saw these two letters, which had been engraven three hundred years before, I stood fixed2 in an attitude of mute surprise.
Not only was there the signature of the learned and enterprising alchemist written in the rock, but I held in my hand the very identical instrument with which he had laboriously3 engraved4 it.
It was impossible, without showing an amount of incredulity scarcely becoming a sane5 man, to deny the existence of the traveler, and the reality of that voyage which I believed all along to have been a myth—the mystification of some fertile brain.
While these reflections were passing through my mind, my uncle, the Professor, gave way to an access of feverish6 and poetical7 excitement.
"Wonderful and glorious genius, great Saknussemm," he cried, "you have left no stone unturned, no resource omitted, to show to other mortals the way into the interior of our mighty8 globe, and your fellow creatures can find the trail left by your illustrious footsteps, three hundred years ago, at the bottom of these obscure subterranean9 abodes10. You have been careful to secure for others the contemplation of these wonders and marvels11 of creation. Your name engraved at every important stage of your glorious journey leads the hopeful traveler direct to the great and mighty discovery to which you devoted12 such energy and courage. The audacious traveler, who shall follow your footsteps to the last, will doubtless find your initials engraved with your own hand upon the centre of the earth. I will be that audacious traveler—I, too, will sign my name upon the very same spot, upon the central granite13 stone of this wondrous14 work of the Creator. But in justice to your devotion, to your courage, and to your being the first to indicate the road, let this cape15, seen by you upon the shores of this sea discovered by you, be called, of all time, Cape Saknussemm."
This is what I heard, and I began to be roused to the pitch of enthusiasm indicated by those words. A fierce excitement roused me. I forgot everything. The dangers of the voyage and the perils16 of the return journey were now as nothing!
What another man had done in ages past could, I felt, be done again; I was determined17 to do it myself, and now nothing that man had accomplished18 appeared to me impossible.
I had already started in the direction of the somber20 and gloomy gallery when the Professor stopped me; he, the man so rash and hasty, he, the man so easily roused to the highest pitch of enthusiasm, checked me, and asked me to be patient and show more calm.
"Let us return to our good friend, Hans," he said; "we will then bring the raft down to this place."
I must say that though I at once yielded to my uncle's request, it was not without dissatisfaction, and I hastened along the rocks of that wonderful coast.
"Do you know, my dear uncle," I said, as we walked along, "that we have been singularly helped by a concurrence21 of circumstances, right up to this very moment."
"Doubtless," I responded, "and strangely enough, even the tempest has been the means of putting us on the right road. Blessings23 on the tempest! It brought us safely back to the very spot from which fine weather would have driven us forever. Supposing we had succeeded in reaching the southern and distant shores of this extraordinary sea, what would have become of us? The name of Saknussemm would never have appeared to us, and at this moment we should have been cast away upon an inhospitable coast, probably without an outlet24."
"Yes, Harry, my boy, there is certainly something providential in that wandering at the mercy of wind and waves towards the south: we have come back exactly north; and what is better still, we fall upon this great discovery of Cape Saknussemm. I mean to say, that it is more than surprising; there is something in it which is far beyond my comprehension. The coincidence is unheard of, marvelous!"
"What matter! It is not our duty to explain facts, but to make the best possible use of them."
"Doubtless, my boy; but if you will allow me—" said the really delighted Professor.
"Excuse me, sir, but I see exactly how it will be; we shall take the northern route; we shall pass under the northern regions of Europe, under Sweden, under Russia, under Siberia, and who knows where—instead of burying ourselves under the burning plains and deserts of Africa, or beneath the mighty waves of the ocean; and that is all, at this stage of our journey, that I care to know. Let us advance, and Heaven will be our guide!"
"Yes, Harry, you are right, quite right; all is for the best. Let us abandon this horizontal sea, which could never have led to anything satisfactory. We shall descend25, descend, and everlastingly26 descend. Do you know, my dear boy, that to reach the interior of the earth we have only five thousand miles to travel!"
"Bah!" I cried, carried away by a burst of enthusiasm, "the distance is scarcely worth speaking about. The thing is to make a start."
My wild, mad, and incoherent speeches continued until we rejoined our patient and phlegmatic27 guide. All was, we found, prepared for an immediate28 departure. There was not a single parcel but what was in its proper place. We all took up our posts on the raft, and the sail being hoisted29, Hans received his directions, and guided the frail30 bark towards Cape Saknussemm, as we had definitely named it.
The wind was very unfavorable to a craft that was unable to sail close to the wind. It was constructed to go before the blast. We were continually reduced to pushing ourselves forward by means of poles. On several occasions the rocks ran far out into deep water and we were compelled to make a long round. At last, after three long and weary hours of navigation, that is to say, about six o'clock in the evening, we found a place at which we could land.
I jumped on shore first. In my present state of excitement and enthusiasm, I was always first. My uncle and the Icelander followed. The voyage from the port to this point of the sea had by no means calmed me. It had rather produced the opposite effect. I even proposed to burn our vessel31, that is, to destroy our raft, in order to completely cut off our retreat. But my uncle sternly opposed this wild project. I began to think him particularly lukewarm and unenthusiastic.
"At any rate, my dear uncle," I said, "let us start without delay."
"Yes, my boy, I am quite as eager to do so as you can be. But, in the first place, let us examine this mysterious gallery, in order to find if we shall need to prepare and mend our ladders."
My uncle now began to see to the efficiency of our Ruhmkorff coil, which would doubtless soon be needed; the raft, securely fastened to a rock, was left alone. Moreover, the opening into the new gallery was not twenty paces distant from the spot. Our little troop, with myself at the head, advanced.
The orifice, which was almost circular, presented a diameter of about five feet; the somber tunnel was cut in the living rock, and coated on the inside by the different material which had once passed through it in a state of fusion32. The lower part was about level with the water, so that we were able to penetrate33 to the interior without difficulty.
We followed an almost horizontal direction; when, at the end of about a dozen paces, our further advance was checked by the interposition of an enormous block of granite rock.
"Accursed stone!" I cried furiously, on perceiving that we were stopped by what seemed an insurmountable obstacle.
In vain we looked to the right, in vain we looked to the left; in vain examined it above and below. There existed no passage, no sign of any other tunnel. I experienced the most bitter and painful disappointment. So enraged34 was I that I would not admit the reality of any obstacle. I stooped to my knees; I looked under the mass of stone. No hole, no interstice. I then looked above. The same barrier of granite! Hans, with the lamp, examined the sides of the tunnel in every direction.
I had seated myself upon the ground. My uncle walked angrily and hopelessly up and down. He was evidently desperate.
"But," I cried, after some moments' thought, "what about Arne Saknussemm?"
"You are right," replied my uncle, "he can never have been checked by a lump of rock."
"No—ten thousand times no," I cried, with extreme vivacity36. "This huge lump of rock, in consequence of some singular concussion37, or process, one of those magnetic phenomena38 which have so often shaken the terrestrial crust, has in some unexpected way closed up the passage. Many and many years have passed away since the return of Saknussemm, and the fall of this huge block of granite. Is it not quite evident that this gallery was formerly39 the outlet for the pent-up lava40 in the interior of the earth, and that these eruptive matters then circulated freely? Look at these recent fissures41 in the granite roof; it is evidently formed of pieces of enormous stone, placed here as if by the hand of a giant, who had worked to make a strong and substantial arch. One day, after an unusually strong shock, the vast rock which stands in our way, and which was doubtless the key of a kind of arch, fell through to a level with the soil and has barred our further progress. We are right, then, in thinking that this is an unexpected obstacle, with which Saknussemm did not meet; and if we do not upset it in some way, we are unworthy of following in the footsteps of the great discoverer; and incapable42 of finding our way to the centre of the earth!"
In this wild way I addressed my uncle. The zeal43 of the Professor, his earnest longing44 for success, had become part and parcel of my being. I wholly forgot the past; I utterly45 despised the future. Nothing existed for me upon the surface of this spheroid in the bosom46 of which I was engulfed47, no towns, no country, no Hamburg, no Koenigstrasse, not even my poor Gretchen, who by this time would believe me utterly lost in the interior of the earth!
"Well," cried my uncle, roused to enthusiasm by my words, "Let us go to work with pickaxes, with crowbars, with anything that comes to hand—but down with these terrible walls."
"It is far too tough and too big to be destroyed by a pickax or crowbar," I replied.
"What then?"
"As I said, it is useless to think of overcoming such a difficulty by means of ordinary tools."
"What then?"
"What else but gunpowder48, a subterranean mine? Let us blow up the obstacle that stands in our way."
"Gunpowder!"
"To work, Hans, to work!" cried the Professor.
The Icelander went back to the raft, and soon returned with a huge crowbar, with which he began to dig a hole in the rock, which was to serve as a mine. It was by no means a slight task. It was necessary for our purpose to make a cavity large enough to hold fifty pounds of fulminating gun cotton, the expansive power of which is four times as great as that of ordinary gunpowder.
I had now roused myself to an almost miraculous50 state of excitement. While Hans was at work, I actively51 assisted my uncle to prepare a long wick, made from damp gunpowder, the mass of which we finally enclosed in a bag of linen52.
"We are bound to go through," I cried, enthusiastically.
"We are bound to go through," responded the Professor, tapping me on the back.
At midnight, our work as miners was completely finished; the charge of fulminating cotton was thrust into the hollow, and the match, which we had made of considerable length, was ready.
A spark was now sufficient to ignite this formidable engine, and to blow the rock to atoms!
"We will now rest until tomorrow."
It was absolutely necessary to resign myself to my fate, and to consent to wait for the explosion for six weary hours!
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1
blase
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| adj.厌烦于享乐的 | |
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fixed
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| adj.固定的，不变的，准备好的；(计算机)固定的 | |
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3
laboriously
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| adv.艰苦地；费力地；辛勤地；（文体等）佶屈聱牙地 | |
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4
engraved
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| v.在（硬物）上雕刻（字，画等）( engrave的过去式和过去分词 )；将某事物深深印在（记忆或头脑中） | |
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5
sane
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| adj.心智健全的，神志清醒的，明智的，稳健的 | |
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6
feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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7
poetical
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| adj.似诗人的；诗一般的；韵文的；富有诗意的 | |
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8
mighty
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| adj.强有力的；巨大的 | |
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9
subterranean
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| adj.地下的，地表下的 | |
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10
abodes
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| 住所( abode的名词复数 )； 公寓； （在某地的）暂住； 逗留 | |
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11
marvels
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| n.奇迹( marvel的名词复数 )；令人惊奇的事物（或事例）；不平凡的成果；成就v.惊奇，对…感到惊奇( marvel的第三人称单数 ) | |
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12
devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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13
granite
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| adj.花岗岩，花岗石 | |
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14
wondrous
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| adj.令人惊奇的，奇妙的；adv.惊人地；异乎寻常地；令人惊叹地 | |
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15
cape
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| n.海角，岬；披肩，短披风 | |
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perils
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| 极大危险( peril的名词复数 )； 危险的事（或环境） | |
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17
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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18
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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19
hearty
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| adj.热情友好的；衷心的；尽情的，纵情的 | |
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20
somber
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| adj.昏暗的，阴天的，阴森的，忧郁的 | |
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21
concurrence
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| n.同意；并发 | |
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harry
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| vt.掠夺，蹂躏，使苦恼 | |
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23
blessings
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| n.（上帝的）祝福( blessing的名词复数 )；好事；福分；因祸得福 | |
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24
outlet
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| n.出口/路；销路；批发商店；通风口；发泄 | |
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25
descend
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| vt./vi.传下来，下来，下降 | |
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26
everlastingly
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| 永久地，持久地 | |
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27
phlegmatic
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| adj.冷静的，冷淡的，冷漠的，无活力的 | |
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28
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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29
hoisted
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| 把…吊起，升起( hoist的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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30
frail
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| adj.身体虚弱的；易损坏的 | |
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31
vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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32
fusion
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| n.溶化；熔解；熔化状态，熔和；熔接 | |
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33
penetrate
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| v.透(渗)入；刺入，刺穿；洞察，了解 | |
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34
enraged
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| 使暴怒( enrage的过去式和过去分词 )； 歜； 激愤 | |
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renounce
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| v.放弃；拒绝承认，宣布与…断绝关系 | |
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vivacity
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| n.快活，活泼，精神充沛 | |
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37
concussion
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| n.脑震荡；震动 | |
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38
phenomena
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| n.现象 | |
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39
formerly
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| adv.从前，以前 | |
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40
lava
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| n.熔岩，火山岩 | |
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41
fissures
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| n.狭长裂缝或裂隙( fissure的名词复数 )；裂伤；分歧；分裂v.裂开( fissure的第三人称单数 ) | |
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42
incapable
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| adj.无能力的，不能做某事的 | |
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43
zeal
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| n.热心，热情，热忱 | |
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44
longing
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| n.（for）渴望 | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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46
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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47
engulfed
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| v.吞没，包住( engulf的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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48
gunpowder
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| n.火药 | |
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49
paltry
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| adj.无价值的，微不足道的 | |
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50
miraculous
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| adj.像奇迹一样的，不可思议的 | |
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51
actively
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| adv.积极地，勤奋地 | |
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52
linen
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| n.亚麻布，亚麻线，亚麻制品；adj.亚麻布制的，亚麻的 | |
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