Chapter 12

I rushed up onto the platform. Yes, open sea! Barely some moving icebergs; a sea stretching into the distance; hosts of birds in the air and myriads of fish under the waters. The thermometer marked 3 degrees centigrade.

“Are we at the pole?” I asked the captain.

“I’ve no idea,” he answered me. “At noon we’ll fix our position.”

“But will the sun show through this mist?” I said, staring at the grayish sky.

“No matter how faintly it shines, it will be enough for me,” the captain replied.

To the south, ten miles from the Nautilus, a solitary islet rose to a height of 200 meters. We proceeded toward it.

In an hour we had reached the islet. Two hours later we had completed a full circle around it. It measured four to five miles in circumference. The skiff was launched to sea. Two crewmen carrying instruments, the captain, Conseil, and I were on board. It was ten o’clock in the morning.

A few strokes of the oar brought the skiff to the sand, where it ran aground. Just as Conseil was about to jump ashore, I held him back.

“Sir,” I told Captain Nemo, “to you belongs the honor of first setting foot on this shore.”

He leaped lightly onto the sand. His heart must have been throbbing with intense excitement. He stood there, mute and motionless, with crossed arms and blazing eyes. After spending five minutes in this trance, he turned to us.

I got out, Conseil followed me, leaving the two men in the skiff.

The beach was strewn with mollusks. I also saw myriads of northernmost sea butterflies three centimeters long. The ground was completely riddled with penguin nests.

Meanwhile the mists didn’t clear, and by eleven o’clock the sun still hadn’t made an appearance. Its absence disturbed me. Without it, no sights were possible. Then how could we tell whether we had reached the pole?

Captain Nemo was leaning silently against a piece of rock and staring at the sky. He seemed impatient, baffled. But what could we do? This daring and powerful man couldn’t control the sun as he did the sea.

“Until tomorrow,” the captain said simply; and we went back to the Nautilus, amid flurries in the air.

The blizzard lasted until the next day. It was impossible to stay on the platform. The next day, March 20, it stopped snowing. The thermometer marked -2 degrees centigrade. The mist had cleared.

“The South Pole!” Captain Nemo replied in a solemn voice, handing me the spyglass, which showed the orb of day cut into two exactly equal parts by the horizon.

Then, resting his hand on my shoulder, Captain Nemo said to me:

“Well now! In 1868, on this 21st day of March, I myself, Captain Nemo, have reached the South Pole.”

Chapter 13

The next day, March 22, at six o’clock in the morning, preparations for departure began. The cold was brisk. The wonderful Southern Cross, polar star of the Antarctic regions, twinkled at its zenith.

The thermometer marked -12 degrees centigrade. Ice floes were increasing over the open water. The ballast tanks filled with water and the Nautilus sank slowly. At a depth of 1,000 feet, it stopped. Its propeller churned the waves and it headed due north at a speed of fifteen miles per hour.

At three o’clock in the morning, I was awakened by a violent collision. I sat up in bed, listening in the darkness, and then was suddenly hurled into the middle of my stateroom. Apparently the Nautilus had gone aground.

Leaning against the walls, I dragged myself down the gangways to the lounge, whose ceiling lights were on. The furniture had been knocked over. Fortunately the glass cases were solidly secured at the base and had stood fast. But we were no longer vertical. So the Nautilus was lying on its starboard side.

In its interior I heard the sound of footsteps and muffled voices. But Captain Nemo didn’t appear. Just as I was about to leave the lounge, Ned Land and Conseil entered.

“What happened?” I instantly said to them.

“I came to ask master that,” Conseil replied.

“Damnation!” the Canadian exclaimed. “I know well what happened! The Nautilus has gone aground.”

“But,” I asked, “are we at least back on the surface of the sea?”

“We have no idea,” Conseil replied.

“It’s easy to find out,” I answered.

I consulted the pressure gauge. Much to my surprise, it indicated a depth of 360 meters.

“What’s the meaning of this?” I exclaimed.

“We must confer with Captain Nemo,” Conseil said.

“But where do we find him?” Ned Land asked.

“Follow me,” I told my two companions.

We left the lounge. Nobody in the library. Nobody by the central companionway or the crew’s quarters. I assumed that Captain Nemo was stationed in the pilothouse. Best to wait. The three of us returned to the lounge.

We had been left to ourselves for twenty minutes, trying to detect the tiniest noises inside the Nautilus, when Captain Nemo entered. He didn’t seem to see us. His facial features, usually so emotionless, revealed a certain uneasiness. He studied the compass and pressure gauge in silence, then went and put his finger on the world map at a spot in the sector depicting the southernmost seas.

I hesitated to interrupt him. But some moments later, when he turned to me, I asked:

“An incident, captain?”

“No, sir,” he replied, “this time an accident.”

“Serious?”

“Perhaps.”

“Is there any immediate danger?”

“No.”

“The Nautilus has run aground?”

“Yes.”

“May I learn, sir,” I asked him, “what caused this accident?”

“An enormous block of ice, an entire mountain,” he answered me.

“But can’t we float the Nautilus clear by emptying its ballast tanks, to regain our balance?”

“Sir, you can hear the pumps working.”

Suddenly a slight movement could be felt over the hull. Obviously the Nautilus was straightening a bit. Objects hanging in the lounge were visibly returning to their normal positions. The walls were approaching the vertical. Nobody said a word. We could see and feel the ship righting itself. The floor was becoming horizontal beneath our feet. Ten minutes went by.

“Finally, we’re upright!” I exclaimed.

“Yes,” Captain Nemo said.

“But will we float off?” I asked him.

“Certainly,” he replied, “since the ballast tanks aren’t yet empty, and when they are, the Nautilus must rise to the surface of the sea.”

The captain went out, and soon the ship had halted its upward movement.

We were fully afloat, as I have said; but on both sides of the ship, about ten meters away, there rose dazzling walls of ice. There also were walls above and below. The Nautilus was imprisoned in a genuine tunnel of ice about twenty meters wide and filled with quiet water. So the ship could easily exit by going either ahead or astern, sinking a few hundred meters deeper, and then taking an open passageway beneath the ice.

The lounge was still brightly lit. This was due to the reflecting power of the walls of ice, which threw the beams right back at us. Words cannot describe the effects produced by our galvanic rays on these huge, whimsically sculpted blocks.

“How beautiful!” Conseil exclaimed.

“Yes,” I said, “it’s a wonderful sight! Isn’t it, Ned?”

“Oh damnation, yes!” Ned Land shot back. “It’s superb! But this sight could cost us dearly. And in all honesty, I think we’re looking at things God never intended for human eyes.”

Ned was right. It was too beautiful. All at once a yell from Conseil made me turn around.

“What is it?” I asked.

“Master must close his eyes! Master mustn’t look!”

With that, Conseil clapped his hands over his eyes.

“But what’s wrong, my boy?”

“I’ve been dazzled, struck blind!”

I realized what had happened. The Nautilus had just started off at great speed. The sparkles from myriads of diamonds were merging with each other. We were traveling through a sheath of flashing light.

It was five o’clock in the morning. Just then there was a collision in the Nautilus’s bow. Its spur had bumped a block of ice. The ship began to move backward.

“We’re going astern?” Conseil said.

“Yes,” I replied. “Apparently the tunnel has no way out at this end.”

“And so ..?”

“So,” I said, “our maneuvers are quite simple. We’ll return in our tracks and go out the southern opening. That’s all.”

The hours passed. I often studied the instruments hanging on the lounge wall. The pressure gauge indicated that the Nautilus stayed at a constant depth of 300 meters. At 8:25 a second collision took place. This time astern. I grew pale. Just then the captain entered the lounge. I went to him.

“Our path is barred to the south?” I asked him.

“Yes, sir. The iceberg closed off every exit.”

“We’re boxed in?”

“Yes.”

Chapter 14

Consequently, above, below, and around the Nautilus, there were impenetrable frozen walls. We were the ice prisoners! The Canadian banged a table with his fearsome fist. Conseil kept still. I stared at the captain. He crossed his arms. He pondered. The Nautilus did not stir.

The captain then broke into speech:

“Gentlemen,” he said in a calm voice, “there are two ways of dying under the conditions in which we’re placed. The first way is death by crushing. The second is death by asphyxiation. I don’t mention the possibility of death by starvation because the Nautilus’s provisions will certainly last longer than we will.”

“As for asphyxiation, captain,” I replied, “that isn’t a cause for alarm, because the air tanks are full.”

“True,” Captain Nemo went on, “but they’ll supply air for only two days. Now then, we’ve been buried beneath the waters for thirty-six hours, and the Nautilus’s heavy atmosphere already needs renewing. In another forty-eight hours, our reserve air will be used up.”

“Well then, captain, let’s free ourselves within forty-eight hours!”

“We’ll try, by cutting through one of these walls surrounding us.”

“Which one?” I asked.

“I’m going to ground the Nautilus on the lower shelf, then my men will put on their diving suits and attack the thinnest of these ice walls.”

“My friends,” I said, “we’re in a serious predicament, but I’m counting on your courage and energy.”

“Sir,” the Canadian replied, “this is no time to bore you with my complaints. I’m ready to do anything I can for the common good.”

“Excellent, Ned,” I said, extending my hand to the Canadian.

“I might add,” he went on, “that if I can be helpful to the captain, he can use me any way he wants.”

I informed the captain of Ned’s proposition, which was promptly accepted. The Canadian got into his underwater costume.

After Ned was dressed, I reentered the lounge, whose windows had been uncovered; stationed next to Conseil, I examined the strata surrounding and supporting the Nautilus.

Captain Nemo bored into the lower surface. There we were separated from the sea by a ten-meter barrier. That’s how thick the iceberg was.

Work began immediately. After two hours of energetic work, Ned Land reentered, exhausted. He and his companions were replaced by new workmen, including Conseil and me. The Nautilus’s chief officer supervised us.

When I returned on board, I was asphyxiated by the carbon dioxide saturating the air. Oh, if only we had the chemical methods that would enable us to drive out this noxious gas! There was no lack of oxygen. But the carbon dioxide produced by our breathing permeated every part of the ship. To absorb it, we would need to fill containers with potassium hydroxide and shake them continually.

The next day, March 26, I returned to my miner’s trade, working to remove the ice. The walls and underbelly had visibly thickened. My pick nearly slipped from my hands. I felt like I was lying in the jaws of a fearsome monster.

Supervising our work, working himself, Captain Nemo passed near me just then. I touched him with my hand and pointed to the walls of our prison. The captain understood and gave me a signal to follow him. We returned on board. My diving suit removed, I went with him to the lounge.

“How long,” I asked, “will the oxygen in the air tanks enable us tobreathe on board?”

The captain looked me straight in the eye.

“After tomorrow,” he said, “the air tanks will be empty!”

I broke out in a cold sweat. Meanwhile, motionless and silent, Captain Nemo stood lost in thought. An idea visibly crossed his mind. At last these words escaped his lips:

“Boiling water!” he muttered.

“Boiling water?” I exclaimed.

“Yes, sir. Nautilus’s pumps must continually inject streams of boiling water into this space. This will raise its temperature and delay its freezing!”

“It’s worth trying!” I said resolutely.

“So let’s try it, professor.”

The next day I felt half suffocated. What a night! I’m unable to depict it. Such sufferings are indescribable. Headaches and dizziness made me feel like a drunk. My companions were experiencing the same symptoms.

That day, the sixth of our imprisonment, Captain Nemo concluded that picks and mattocks were too slow to deal with the ice layer still separating us from open water—and he decided to crush this layer.

The Nautilus sank into the waters like a cannonball. But how long would it take to navigate under the ice to the open sea? Another day? I would be dead first!

Half lying on a couch in the library, I was suffocating. My face was purple, my lips blue. I could no longer see or hear. I had lost all sense of time. My muscles had no power to contract. I realized that I was about to die.

Suddenly I regained consciousness. A few whiffs of air had entered my lungs. Had we risen to the surface of the waves?

No! Ned and Conseil, my two gallant friends, were sacrificing themselves to save me. A few atoms of air were still left in the device. Instead of breathing it themselves, they had saved it for me, and while they were suffocating, they poured life into me drop by drop! I tried to push the device away. They held my hands, and for a few moments I could breathe luxuriously.

It was eleven in the morning. It had to be March 28. The Nautilus was traveling at the frightful speed of forty miles per hour. It was writhing in the waters.

Where was Captain Nemo? Had he perished? Had his companions died with him?

Just then the pressure gauge indicated we were no more than twenty feet from the surface.

And the Nautilus crushed the ice beneath its weight!

The hatches were opened, and waves of clean air were admitted into every part of the ship.