“We must inquire into this to-morrow,” he exclaimed, as darkness fell suddenly upon him. Then, after a pause, he added: “That is to say, if there is to be a to-morrow; for if I were to be put to the torture, I could not tell what has become of the sun.”
“May I ask, sir, what we are to do now?” put in Ben Zoof.
“Stay where we are for the present; and when daylight appears — if it ever does appear — we will explore the coast to the west and south, and return to the gourbi. If we can find out nothing else, we must at least discover where we are.”
“Meanwhile, sir, may we go to sleep?”
“Certainly, if you like, and if you can.”
Nothing loath5 to avail himself of his master’s permission, Ben Zoof crouched6 down in an angle of the shore, threw his arms over his eyes, and very soon slept the sleep of the ignorant, which is often sounder than the sleep of the just. Overwhelmed by the questions that crowded upon his brain, Captain Servadac could only wander up and down the shore. Again and again he asked himself what the catastrophe7 could portend8. Had the towns of Algiers, Oran, and Mostaganem escaped the inundation9? Could he bring himself to believe that all the inhabitants, his friends, and comrades had perished; or was it not more probable that the Mediterranean10 had merely invaded the region of the mouth of the Shelif? But this supposition did not in the least explain the other physical disturbances11. Another hypothesis that presented itself to his mind was that the African coast might have been suddenly transported to the equatorial zone. But although this might get over the difficulty of the altered altitude of the sun and the absence of twilight12, yet it would neither account for the sun setting in the east, nor for the length of the day being reduced to six hours.
“We must wait till to-morrow,” he repeated; adding, for he had become distrustful of the future, “that is to say, if to-morrow ever comes.”
Although not very learned in astronomy, Servadac was acquainted with the position of the principal constellations13. It was therefore a considerable disappointment to him that, in consequence of the heavy clouds, not a star was visible in the firmament14. To have ascertained15 that the pole-star had become displaced would have been an undeniable proof that the earth was revolving16 on a new axis17; but not a rift18 appeared in the lowering clouds, which seemed to threaten torrents19 of rain.
It happened that the moon was new on that very day; naturally, therefore, it would have set at the same time as the sun. What, then, was the captain’s bewilderment when, after he had been walking for about an hour and a half, he noticed on the western horizon a strong glare that penetrated20 even the masses of the clouds.
“The moon in the west!” he cried aloud; but suddenly bethinking himself, he added: “But no, that cannot be the moon; unless she had shifted very much nearer the earth, she could never give a light as intense as this.”
As he spoke21 the screen of vapor22 was illuminated23 to such a degree that the whole country was as it were bathed in twilight. “What can this be?” soliloquized the captain. “It cannot be the sun, for the sun set in the east only an hour and a half ago. Would that those clouds would disclose what enormous luminary24 lies behind them! What a fool I was not to have learnt more astronomy! Perhaps, after all, I am racking my brain over something that is quite in the ordinary course of nature.”
But, reason as he might, the mysteries of the heavens still remained impenetrable. For about an hour some luminous25 body, its disc evidently of gigantic dimensions, shed its rays upon the upper strata26 of the clouds; then, marvelous to relate, instead of obeying the ordinary laws of celestial27 mechanism28, and descending29 upon the opposite horizon, it seemed to retreat farther off, grew dimmer, and vanished.
The darkness that returned to the face of the earth was not more profound than the gloom which fell upon the captain’s soul. Everything was incomprehensible. The simplest mechanical rules seemed falsified; the planets had defied the laws of gravitation; the motions of the celestial spheres were erroneous as those of a watch with a defective30 mainspring, and there was reason to fear that the sun would never again shed his radiance upon the earth.
But these last fears were groundless. In three hours’ time, without any intervening twilight, the morning sun made its appearance in the west, and day once more had dawned. On consulting his watch, Servadac found that night had lasted precisely31 six hours. Ben Zoof, who was unaccustomed to so brief a period of repose32, was still slumbering33 soundly.
“Come, wake up!” said Servadac, shaking him by the shoulder; “it is time to start.”
“Time to start?” exclaimed Ben Zoof, rubbing his eyes. “I feel as if I had only just gone to sleep.”
“You have slept all night, at any rate,” replied the captain; “it has only been for six hours, but you must make it enough.”
“Enough it shall be, sir,” was the submissive rejoinder.
“And now,” continued Servadac, “we will take the shortest way back to the gourbi, and see what our horses think about it all.”
“They will think that they ought to be groomed,” said the orderly.
“Very good; you may groom34 them and saddle them as quickly as you like. I want to know what has become of the rest of Algeria: if we cannot get round by the south to Mostaganem, we must go eastwards35 to Tenes.” And forthwith they started. Beginning to feel hungry, they had no hesitation36 in gathering37 figs38, dates, and oranges from the plantations39 that formed a continuous rich and luxuriant orchard40 along their path. The district was quite deserted41, and they had no reason to fear any legal penalty.
In an hour and a half they reached the gourbi. Everything was just as they had left it, and it was evident that no one had visited the place during their absence. All was desolate42 as the shore they had quitted.
The preparations for the expedition were brief and simple. Ben Zoof saddled the horses and filled his pouch43 with biscuits and game; water, he felt certain, could be obtained in abundance from the numerous affluents44 of the Shelif, which, although they had now become tributaries45 of the Mediterranean, still meandered46 through the plain. Captain Servadac mounted his horse Zephyr47, and Ben Zoof simultaneously48 got astride his mare49 Galette, named after the mill of Montmartre. They galloped50 off in the direction of the Shelif, and were not long in discovering that the diminution51 in the pressure of the atmosphere had precisely the same effect upon their horses as it had had upon themselves. Their muscular strength seemed five times as great as hitherto; their hoofs52 scarcely touched the ground, and they seemed transformed from ordinary quadrupeds into veritable hippogriffs. Happily, Servadac and his orderly were fearless riders; they made no attempt to curb53 their steeds, but even urged them to still greater exertions54. Twenty minutes sufficed to carry them over the four or five miles that intervened between the gourbi and the mouth of the Shelif; then, slackening their speed, they proceeded at a more leisurely55 pace to the southeast, along what had once been the right bank of the river, but which, although it still retained its former characteristics, was now the boundary of a sea, which extending farther than the limits of the horizon, must have swallowed up at least a large portion of the province of Oran. Captain Servadac knew the country well; he had at one time been engaged upon a trigo-nometrical survey of the district, and consequently had an accurate knowledge of its topography. His idea now was to draw up a report of his investigations56: to whom that report should be delivered was a problem he had yet to solve.
During the four hours of daylight that still remained, the travelers rode about twenty-one miles from the river mouth. To their vast surprise, they did not meet a single human being. At nightfall they again encamped in a slight bend of the shore, at a point which on the previous evening had faced the mouth of the Mina, one of the left-hand affluents of the Shelif, but now absorbed into the newly revealed ocean. Ben Zoof made the sleeping accommodation as comfortable as the circumstances would allow; the horses were clogged57 and turned out to feed upon the rich pasture that clothed the shore, and the night passed without special incident.
At sunrise on the following morning, the 2nd of January, or what, according to the ordinary calendar, would have been the night of the 1st, the captain and his orderly remounted their horses, and during the six-hours’ day accomplished58 a distance of forty-two miles. The right bank of the river still continued to be the margin59 of the land, and only in one spot had its integrity been impaired60. This was about twelve miles from the Mina, and on the site of the annex61 or suburb of Surkelmittoo. Here a large portion of the bank had been swept away, and the hamlet, with its eight hundred inhabitants, had no doubt been swallowed up by the encroaching waters. It seemed, therefore, more than probable that a similar fate had overtaken the larger towns beyond the Shelif.
In the evening the explorers encamped, as previously62, in a nook of the shore which here abruptly63 terminated their new domain64, not far from where they might have expected to find the important village of Memounturroy; but of this, too, there was now no trace. “I had quite reckoned upon a supper and a bed at Orleansville to-night,” said Servadac, as, full of despondency, he surveyed the waste of water.
“Quite impossible,” replied Ben Zoof, “except you had gone by a boat. But cheer up, sir, cheer up; we will soon devise some means for getting across to Mostaganem.”
“If, as I hope,” rejoined the captain, “we are on a peninsula, we are more likely to get to Tenes; there we shall hear the news.”
“Far more likely to carry the news ourselves,” answered Ben Zoof, as he threw himself down for his night’s rest.
Six hours later, only waiting for sunrise, Captain Servadac set himself in movement again to renew his investigations. At this spot the shore, that hitherto had been running in a southeasterly direction, turned abruptly to the north, being no longer formed by the natural bank of the Shelif, but consisting of an absolutely new coast-line. No land was in sight. Nothing could be seen of Orleansville, which ought to have been about six miles to the southwest; and Ben Zoof, who had mounted the highest point of view attainable65, could distinguish sea, and nothing but sea, to the farthest horizon.
Quitting their encampment and riding on, the bewildered explorers kept close to the new shore. This, since it had ceased to be formed by the original river bank, had considerably66 altered its aspect. Frequent landslips occurred, and in many places deep chasms67 rifted the ground; great gaps furrowed68 the fields, and trees, half uprooted69, overhung the water, remarkable70 by the fantastic distortions of their gnarled trunks, looking as though they had been chopped by a hatchet71.
The sinuosities of the coast line, alternately gully and headland, had the effect of making a devious72 progress for the travelers, and at sunset, although they had accomplished more than twenty miles, they had only just arrived at the foot of the Merdeyah Mountains, which, before the cataclysm73, had formed the extremity74 of the chain of the Little Atlas75. The ridge76, however, had been violently ruptured77, and now rose perpendicularly78 from the water.
On the following morning Servadac and Ben Zoof traversed one of the mountain gorges79; and next, in order to make a more thorough acquaintance with the limits and condition of the section of Algerian territory of which they seemed to be left as the sole occupants, they dismounted, and proceeded on foot to the summit of one of the highest peaks. From this elevation80 they ascertained that from the base of the Merdeyah to the Mediterranean, a distance of about eighteen miles, a new coast line had come into existence; no land was visible in any direction; no isthmus81 existed to form a connecting link with the territory of Tenes, which had entirely82 disappeared. The result was that Captain Servadac was driven to the irresistible83 conclusion that the tract84 of land which he had been surveying was not, as he had at first imagined, a peninsula; it was actually an island.
Strictly85 speaking, this island was quadrilateral, but the sides were so irregular that it was much more nearly a triangle, the comparison of the sides exhibiting these proportions: The section of the right bank of the Shelif, seventy-two miles; the southern boundary from the Shelif to the chain of the Little Atlas, twenty-one miles; from the Little Atlas to the Mediterranean, eighteen miles; and sixty miles of the shore of the Mediterranean itself, making in all an entire circumference86 of about 171 miles.
“What does it all mean?” exclaimed the captain, every hour growing more and more bewildered.
“The will of Providence87, and we must submit,” replied Ben Zoof, calm and undisturbed. With this reflection, the two men silently descended88 the mountain and remounted their horses. Before evening they had reached the Mediterranean. On their road they failed to discern a vestige89 of the little town of Montenotte; like Tenes, of which not so much as a ruined cottage was visible on the horizon, it seemed to be annihilated90.
On the following day, the 6th of January, the two men made a forced march along the coast of the Mediterranean, which they found less altered than the captain had at first supposed; but four villages had entirely disappeared, and the headlands, unable to resist the shock of the convulsion, had been detached from the mainland.
The circuit of the island had been now completed, and the explorers, after a period of sixty hours, found themselves once more beside the ruins of their gourbi. Five days, or what, according to the established order of things, would have been two days and a half, had been occupied in tracing the boundaries of their new domain; and they had ascertained beyond a doubt that they were the sole human inhabitants left upon the island.
“Well, sir, here you are, Governor General of Algeria!” exclaimed Ben Zoof, as they reached the gourbi.
“With not a soul to govern,” gloomily rejoined the captain.
“How so? Do you not reckon me?”
“Pshaw! Ben Zoof, what are you?”
“What am I? Why, I am the population.”
The captain deigned91 no reply, but, muttering some expressions of regret for the fruitless trouble he had taken about his rondo, betook himself to rest.
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1
untoward
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| adj.不利的，不幸的，困难重重的 | |
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cannon
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| n.大炮，火炮；飞机上的机关炮 | |
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temperament
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| n.气质，性格，性情 | |
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phenomena
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| n.现象 | |
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loath
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| adj.不愿意的；勉强的 | |
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crouched
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| v.屈膝，蹲伏( crouch的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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catastrophe
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| n.大灾难，大祸 | |
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portend
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| v.预兆，预示；给…以警告 | |
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inundation
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| n.the act or fact of overflowing | |
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Mediterranean
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| adj.地中海的；地中海沿岸的 | |
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disturbances
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| n.骚乱( disturbance的名词复数 )；打扰；困扰；障碍 | |
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twilight
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| n.暮光，黄昏；暮年，晚期，衰落时期 | |
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13
constellations
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| n.星座( constellation的名词复数 )；一群杰出人物；一系列（相关的想法、事物）；一群（相关的人） | |
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firmament
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| n.苍穹；最高层 | |
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ascertained
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| v.弄清，确定，查明( ascertain的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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revolving
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| adj.旋转的，轮转式的；循环的v.（使）旋转( revolve的现在分词 )；细想 | |
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axis
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| n.轴，轴线，中心线；坐标轴，基准线 | |
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rift
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| n.裂口，隙缝，切口；v.裂开，割开，渗入 | |
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torrents
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| n.倾注；奔流( torrent的名词复数 )；急流；爆发；连续不断 | |
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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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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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vapor
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| n.蒸汽，雾气 | |
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illuminated
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| adj.被照明的；受启迪的 | |
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luminary
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| n.名人，天体 | |
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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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strata
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| n.地层（复数）；社会阶层 | |
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celestial
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| adj.天体的；天上的 | |
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mechanism
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| n.机械装置；机构，结构 | |
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descending
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| n. 下行 adj. 下降的 | |
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defective
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| adj.有毛病的，有问题的，有瑕疵的 | |
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precisely
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| adv.恰好，正好，精确地，细致地 | |
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repose
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| v.(使)休息；n.安息 | |
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slumbering
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| 微睡，睡眠（slumber的现在分词形式） | |
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groom
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| vt.给（马、狗等）梳毛，照料，使...整洁 | |
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eastwards
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| adj.向东方（的），朝东（的）；n.向东的方向 | |
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hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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gathering
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| n.集会，聚会，聚集 | |
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figs
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| figures 数字，图形，外形 | |
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plantations
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| n.种植园，大农场( plantation的名词复数 ) | |
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orchard
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| n.果园，果园里的全部果树，(美俚)棒球场 | |
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deserted
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| adj.荒芜的，荒废的，无人的，被遗弃的 | |
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desolate
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| adj.荒凉的，荒芜的；孤独的，凄凉的；v.使荒芜，使孤寂 | |
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pouch
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| n.小袋，小包，囊状袋；vt.装...入袋中，用袋运输；vi.用袋送信件 | |
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44
affluents
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| n.富裕的，富足的( affluent的名词复数 ) | |
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tributaries
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| n. 支流 | |
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meandered
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| （指溪流、河流等）蜿蜒而流( meander的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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zephyr
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| n.和风，微风 | |
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simultaneously
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| adv.同时发生地，同时进行地 | |
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mare
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| n.母马，母驴 | |
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50
galloped
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| （使马）飞奔，奔驰( gallop的过去式和过去分词 )； 快速做[说]某事 | |
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51
diminution
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| n.减少；变小 | |
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52
hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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53
curb
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| n.场外证券市场，场外交易；vt.制止，抑制 | |
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exertions
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| n.努力( exertion的名词复数 )；费力；（能力、权力等的）运用；行使 | |
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leisurely
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| adj.悠闲的；从容的，慢慢的 | |
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56
investigations
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| （正式的）调查( investigation的名词复数 )； 侦查； 科学研究； 学术研究 | |
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57
clogged
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| （使）阻碍( clog的过去式和过去分词 )； 淤滞 | |
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58
accomplished
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| adj.有才艺的；有造诣的；达到了的 | |
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margin
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| n.页边空白；差额；余地，余裕；边，边缘 | |
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impaired
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| adj.受损的；出毛病的；有（身体或智力）缺陷的v.损害，削弱( impair的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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annex
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| vt.兼并，吞并；n.附属建筑物 | |
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previously
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| adv.以前，先前（地） | |
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abruptly
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| adv.突然地，出其不意地 | |
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64
domain
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| n.(活动等)领域，范围；领地，势力范围 | |
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65
attainable
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| a.可达到的，可获得的 | |
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66
considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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chasms
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| 裂缝( chasm的名词复数 )； 裂口； 分歧； 差别 | |
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furrowed
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| v.犁田，开沟( furrow的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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uprooted
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| v.把（某物）连根拔起( uproot的过去式和过去分词 )；根除；赶走；把…赶出家园 | |
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70
remarkable
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| adj.显著的，异常的，非凡的，值得注意的 | |
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71
hatchet
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| n.短柄小斧；v.扼杀 | |
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72
devious
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| adj.不坦率的，狡猾的；迂回的，曲折的 | |
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cataclysm
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| n.洪水，剧变，大灾难 | |
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extremity
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| n.末端，尽头；尽力；终极；极度 | |
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atlas
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| n.地图册，图表集 | |
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ridge
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| n.山脊；鼻梁；分水岭 | |
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ruptured
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| v.（使）破裂( rupture的过去式和过去分词 )；（使体内组织等）断裂；使（友好关系）破裂；使绝交 | |
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perpendicularly
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| adv. 垂直地, 笔直地, 纵向地 | |
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gorges
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| n.山峡，峡谷( gorge的名词复数 )；咽喉v.（用食物把自己）塞饱，填饱( gorge的第三人称单数 )；作呕 | |
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elevation
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| n.高度；海拔；高地；上升；提高 | |
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isthmus
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| n.地峡 | |
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entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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irresistible
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| adj.非常诱人的，无法拒绝的，无法抗拒的 | |
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tract
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| n.传单，小册子，大片(土地或森林) | |
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strictly
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| adv.严厉地，严格地；严密地 | |
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circumference
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| n.圆周，周长，圆周线 | |
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providence
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| n.深谋远虑，天道，天意；远见；节约；上帝 | |
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descended
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| a.为...后裔的，出身于...的 | |
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vestige
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| n.痕迹，遗迹，残余 | |
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annihilated
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| v.（彻底）消灭( annihilate的过去式和过去分词 )；使无效；废止；彻底击溃 | |
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deigned
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| v.屈尊，俯就( deign的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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