A mast was made of two poles spliced3 together, a yard was made of a third, a blanket borrowed from our coverings made a tolerable sail. There was no want of cordage for the rigging, and everything was well and firmly made.
The provisions, the baggage, the instruments, the guns, and a good quantity of fresh water from the rocks around, all found their proper places on board; and at six the Professor gave the signal to embark4. Hans had fitted up a rudder to steer5 his vessel6. He took the tiller, and unmoored; the sail was set, and we were soon afloat. At the moment of leaving the harbour, my uncle, who was tenaciously7 fond of naming his new discoveries, wanted to give it a name, and proposed mine amongst others.
"But I have a better to propose," I said: "Grauben. Let it be called
Port Gräuben; it will look very well upon the map."
"Port Gräuben let it be then."
And so the cherished remembrance of my Virlandaise became associated with our adventurous8 expedition.
The wind was from the north-west. We went with it at a high rate of speed. The dense9 atmosphere acted with great force and impelled10 us swiftly on.
In an hour my uncle had been able to estimate our progress. At this rate, he said, we shall make thirty leagues in twenty-four hours, and we shall soon come in sight of the opposite shore.
I made no answer, but went and sat forward. The northern shore was already beginning to dip under the horizon. The eastern and western strands12 spread wide as if to bid us farewell. Before our eyes lay far and wide a vast sea; shadows of great clouds swept heavily over its silver-grey surface; the glistening13 bluish rays of electric light, here and there reflected by the dancing drops of spray, shot out little sheaves of light from the track we left in our rear. Soon we entirely14 lost sight of land; no object was left for the eye to judge by, and but for the frothy track of the raft, I might have thought we were standing15 still.
About twelve, immense shoals of seaweeds came in sight. I was aware of the great powers of vegetation that characterise these plants, which grow at a depth of twelve thousand feet, reproduce themselves under a pressure of four hundred atmospheres, and sometimes form barriers strong enough to impede16 the course of a ship. But never, I think, were such seaweeds as those which we saw floating in immense waving lines upon the sea of Liedenbrock.
Our raft skirted the whole length of the fuci, three or four thousand feet long, undulating like vast serpents beyond the reach of sight; I found some amusement in tracing these endless waves, always thinking I should come to the end of them, and for hours my patience was vying17 with my surprise.
What natural force could have produced such plants, and what must have been the appearance of the earth in the first ages of its formation, when, under the action of heat and moisture, the vegetable kingdom alone was developing on its surface?
Evening came, and, as on the previous day, I perceived no change in the luminous18 condition of the air. It was a constant condition, the permanency of which might be relied upon.
After supper I laid myself down at the foot of the mast, and fell asleep in the midst of fantastic reveries.
Hans, keeping fast by the helm, let the raft run on, which, after all, needed no steering19, the wind blowing directly aft.
Since our departure from Port Gräuben, Professor Liedenbrock had entrusted20 the log to my care; I was to register every observation, make entries of interesting phenomena21, the direction of the wind, the rate of sailing, the way we made—in a word, every particular of our singular voyage.
I shall therefore reproduce here these daily notes, written, so to speak, as the course of events directed, in order to furnish an exact narrative22 of our passage.
Friday, August 14.—Wind steady, N.W. The raft makes rapid way in a direct line. Coast thirty leagues to leeward23. Nothing in sight before us. Intensity24 of light the same. Weather fine; that is to say, that the clouds are flying high, are light, and bathed in a white atmosphere resembling silver in a state of fusion25. Therm. 89° Fahr.
At noon Hans prepared a hook at the end of a line. He baited it with a small piece of meat and flung it into the sea. For two hours nothing was caught. Are these waters, then, bare of inhabitants? No, there's a pull at the line. Hans draws it in and brings out a struggling fish.
"A sturgeon," I cried; "a small sturgeon."
The Professor eyes the creature attentively26, and his opinion differs from mine.
The head of this fish was flat, but rounded in front, and the anterior27 part of its body was plated with bony, angular scales; it had no teeth, its pectoral fins28 were large, and of tail there was none. The animal belonged to the same order as the sturgeon, but differed from that fish in many essential particulars. After a short examination my uncle pronounced his opinion.
"This fish belongs to an extinct family, of which only fossil traces are found in the devonian formations."
"Yes; and you will observe that these fossil fishes have no identity with any living species. To have in one's possession a living specimen31 is a happy event for a naturalist32."
"But to what family does it belong?"
"It is of the order of ganoids, of the family of the cephalaspidae; and a species of pterichthys. But this one displays a peculiarity33 confined to all fishes that inhabit subterranean34 waters. It is blind, and not only blind, but actually has no eyes at all."
I looked: nothing could be more certain. But supposing it might be a solitary35 case, we baited afresh, and threw out our line. Surely this ocean is well peopled with fish, for in another couple of hours we took a large quantity of pterichthydes, as well as of others belonging to the extinct family of the dipterides, but of which my uncle could not tell the species; none had organs of sight. This unhoped-for catch recruited our stock of provisions.
Thus it is evident that this sea contains none but species known to us in their fossil state, in which fishes as well as reptiles36 are the less perfectly37 and completely organised the farther back their date of creation.
Perhaps we may yet meet with some of those saurians which science has reconstructed out of a bit of bone or cartilage. I took up the telescope and scanned the whole horizon, and found it everywhere a desert sea. We are far away removed from the shores.
I gaze upward in the air. Why should not some of the strange birds restored by the immortal38 Cuvier again flap their 'sail-broad vans' in this dense and heavy atmosphere? There are sufficient fish for their support. I survey the whole space that stretches overhead; it is as desert as the shore was.
Still my imagination carried me away amongst the wonderful speculations39 of palæontology. Though awake I fell into a dream. I thought I could see floating on the surface of the waters enormous chelonia, pre-adamite tortoises, resembling floating islands. Over the dimly lighted strand11 there trod the huge mammals of the first ages of the world, the leptotherium (slender beast), found in the caverns40 of Brazil; the merycotherium (ruminating beast), found in the 'drift' of iceclad Siberia. Farther on, the pachydermatous lophiodon (crested toothed), a gigantic tapir, hides behind the rocks to dispute its prey41 with the anoplotherium (unarmed beast), a strange creature, which seemed a compound of horse, rhinoceros42, camel, and hippopotamus43. The colossal44 mastodon (nipple-toothed) twists and untwists his trunk, and brays45 and pounds with his huge tusks46 the fragments of rock that cover the shore; whilst the megatherium (huge beast), buttressed47 upon his enormous hinder paws, grubs in the soil, awaking the sonorous48 echoes of the granite49 rocks with his tremendous roarings. Higher up, the protopitheca—the first monkey that appeared on the globe—is climbing up the steep ascents50. Higher yet, the pterodactyle (wing-fingered) darts51 in irregular zigzags52 to and fro in the heavy air. In the uppermost regions of the air immense birds, more powerful than the cassowary, and larger than the ostrich53, spread their vast breadth of wings and strike with their heads the granite vault54 that bounds the sky.
All this fossil world rises to life again in my vivid imagination. I return to the scriptural periods or ages of the world, conventionally called 'days,' long before the appearance of man, when the unfinished world was as yet unfitted for his support. Then my dream backed even farther still into the ages before the creation of living beings. The mammals disappear, then the birds vanish, then the reptiles of the secondary period, and finally the fish, the crustaceans55, molluscs, and articulated beings. Then the zoophytes of the transition period also return to nothing. I am the only living thing in the world: all life is concentrated in my beating heart alone. There are no more seasons; climates are no more; the heat of the globe continually increases and neutralises that of the sun. Vegetation becomes accelerated. I glide56 like a shade amongst arborescent ferns, treading with unsteady feet the coloured marls and the particoloured clays; I lean for support against the trunks of immense conifers; I lie in the shade of sphenophylla (wedge-leaved), asterophylla (star-leaved), and lycopods, a hundred feet high.
Ages seem no more than days! I am passed, against my will, in retrograde order, through the long series of terrestrial changes. Plants disappear; granite rocks soften57; intense heat converts solid bodies into thick fluids; the waters again cover the face of the earth; they boil, they rise in whirling eddies58 of steam; white and ghastly mists wrap round the shifting forms of the earth, which by imperceptible degrees dissolves into a gaseous59 mass, glowing fiery60 red and white, as large and as shining as the sun.
And I myself am floating with wild caprice in the midst of this nebulous mass of fourteen hundred thousand times the volume of the earth into which it will one day be condensed, and carried forward amongst the planetary bodies. My body is no longer firm and terrestrial; it is resolved into its constituent61 atoms, subtilised, volatilised. Sublimed62 into imponderable vapour, I mingle63 and am lost in the endless foods of those vast globular volumes of vaporous mists, which roll upon their flaming orbits through infinite space.
But is it not a dream? Whither is it carrying me? My feverish64 hand has vainly attempted to describe upon paper its strange and wonderful details. I have forgotten everything that surrounds me. The Professor, the guide, the raft—are all gone out of my ken29. An illusion has laid hold upon me.
"What is the matter?" my uncle breaks in.
"Take care, Axel, or you will fall overboard."
At that moment I felt the sinewy66 hand of Hans seizing me vigorously. But for him, carried away by my dream, I should have thrown myself into the sea.
"Is he mad?" cried the Professor.
"What is it all about?" at last I cried, returning to myself.
"Do you feel ill?" my uncle asked.
"No; but I have had a strange hallucination; it is over now. Is all going on right?"
"Yes, it is a fair wind and a fine sea; we are sailing rapidly along, and if I am not out in my reckoning, we shall soon land."
At these words I rose and gazed round upon the horizon, still everywhere bounded by clouds alone.
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1
expeditious
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| adj.迅速的，敏捷的 | |
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fatiguing
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| a.使人劳累的 | |
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3
spliced
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| adj.（针织品）加固的n.叠接v.绞接( splice的过去式和过去分词 )；捻接（两段绳子）；胶接；粘接（胶片、磁带等） | |
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4
embark
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| vi.乘船，着手，从事，上飞机 | |
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steer
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| vt.驾驶，为…操舵；引导；vi.驾驶 | |
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6
vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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7
tenaciously
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| 坚持地 | |
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8
adventurous
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| adj.爱冒险的；惊心动魄的，惊险的，刺激的 | |
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9
dense
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| a.密集的，稠密的，浓密的；密度大的 | |
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10
impelled
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| v.推动、推进或敦促某人做某事( impel的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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11
strand
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| vt.使（船）搁浅，使（某人）困于（某地） | |
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12
strands
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| n.（线、绳、金属线、毛发等的）股( strand的名词复数 )；缕；海洋、湖或河的)岸；（观点、计划、故事等的）部份v.使滞留，使搁浅( strand的第三人称单数 ) | |
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13
glistening
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| adj.闪耀的，反光的v.湿物闪耀，闪亮( glisten的现在分词 ) | |
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14
entirely
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| ad.全部地，完整地；完全地，彻底地 | |
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15
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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16
impede
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| v.妨碍，阻碍，阻止 | |
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17
vying
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| adj.竞争的；比赛的 | |
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18
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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19
steering
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| n.操舵装置 | |
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20
entrusted
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| v.委托，托付( entrust的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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21
phenomena
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| n.现象 | |
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22
narrative
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| n.叙述，故事；adj.叙事的，故事体的 | |
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23
leeward
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| adj.背风的；下风的 | |
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24
intensity
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| n.强烈，剧烈；强度；烈度 | |
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25
fusion
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| n.溶化；熔解；熔化状态，熔和；熔接 | |
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26
attentively
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| adv.聚精会神地；周到地；谛；凝神 | |
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anterior
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| adj.较早的；在前的 | |
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fins
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| [医]散热片；鱼鳍；飞边；鸭掌 | |
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29
ken
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| n.视野，知识领域 | |
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30
primitive
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| adj.原始的；简单的；n.原(始)人，原始事物 | |
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specimen
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| n.样本，标本 | |
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32
naturalist
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| n.博物学家(尤指直接观察动植物者) | |
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peculiarity
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| n.独特性，特色；特殊的东西；怪癖 | |
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subterranean
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| adj.地下的，地表下的 | |
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35
solitary
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| adj.孤独的，独立的，荒凉的；n.隐士 | |
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reptiles
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| n.爬行动物，爬虫( reptile的名词复数 ) | |
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perfectly
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| adv.完美地，无可非议地，彻底地 | |
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38
immortal
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| adj.不朽的；永生的，不死的；神的 | |
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39
speculations
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| n.投机买卖( speculation的名词复数 )；思考；投机活动；推断 | |
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40
caverns
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| 大山洞，大洞穴( cavern的名词复数 ) | |
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41
prey
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| n.被掠食者，牺牲者，掠食；v.捕食，掠夺，折磨 | |
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42
rhinoceros
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| n.犀牛 | |
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43
hippopotamus
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| n.河马 | |
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44
colossal
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| adj.异常的，庞大的 | |
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45
brays
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| n.驴叫声，似驴叫的声音( bray的名词复数 )；（喇叭的）嘟嘟声v.发出驴叫似的声音( bray的第三人称单数 )；发嘟嘟声；粗声粗气地讲话（或大笑）；猛击 | |
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46
tusks
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| n.（象等动物的）长牙( tusk的名词复数 )；獠牙；尖形物；尖头 | |
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47
buttressed
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| v.用扶壁支撑，加固( buttress的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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48
sonorous
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| adj.响亮的，回响的；adv.圆润低沉地；感人地；n.感人，堂皇 | |
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49
granite
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| adj.花岗岩，花岗石 | |
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50
ascents
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| n.上升( ascent的名词复数 )；（身份、地位等的）提高；上坡路；攀登 | |
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51
darts
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| n.掷飞镖游戏；飞镖( dart的名词复数 )；急驰，飞奔v.投掷，投射( dart的第三人称单数 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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52
zigzags
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| n.锯齿形的线条、小径等( zigzag的名词复数 )v.弯弯曲曲地走路，曲折地前进( zigzag的第三人称单数 ) | |
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53
ostrich
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| n.鸵鸟 | |
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54
vault
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| n.拱形圆顶，地窖，地下室 | |
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55
crustaceans
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| n.甲壳纲动物（如蟹、龙虾）( crustacean的名词复数 ) | |
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56
glide
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| n./v.溜，滑行；(时间)消逝 | |
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57
soften
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| v.(使)变柔软；(使)变柔和 | |
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58
eddies
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| （水、烟等的）漩涡，涡流( eddy的名词复数 ) | |
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59
gaseous
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| adj.气体的，气态的 | |
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60
fiery
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| adj.燃烧着的，火红的；暴躁的；激烈的 | |
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61
constituent
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| n.选民；成分，组分；adj.组成的，构成的 | |
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62
sublimed
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| 伟大的( sublime的过去式和过去分词 )； 令人赞叹的； 极端的； 不顾后果的 | |
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63
mingle
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| vt.使混合，使相混；vi.混合起来；相交往 | |
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64
feverish
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| adj.发烧的，狂热的，兴奋的 | |
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65
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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66
sinewy
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| adj.多腱的，强壮有力的 | |
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