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“Ah, commander,” I exclaimed with conviction, “your Nautilus is truly a marvelous boat!”
“Yes, professor,” Captain Nemo replied with genuine excitement, “and I love it as if it were my own flesh and blood! This is an ideal ship! And I’m its captain, builder, and engineer all in one!”
I couldn’t resist asking one question.
“You’re an engineer, then, Captain Nemo?”
“Yes, professor,” he answered me. “I studied in London, Paris, and New York back in the days when I was a resident of the earth’s continents.”
“But how were you able to build this wonderful ship in secret?”
“Each part of it, Professor Aronnax, came from a different spot on the globe. Its keel was forged in France, the sheet-iron plates for its hull in Liverpool, its propeller in Glasgow. Its tanks were manufactured in Paris, its engine in Prussia, its spur in Sweden, its precision instruments in New York, etc.”
“But,” I went on, “once these parts were manufactured, didn’t they have to be mounted and adjusted?”
“Professor, I set up my workshops on a deserted islet in the middle of the ocean. There our Nautilus was completed by me and my workmen. Then, when the operation was over, we burned every trace of our stay on that islet.”
“May I assume that such a boat costs a fortune?”
“About 2,000,000 francs; and 5,000,000 with all the collections and works of art it contains.”
“One last question, Captain Nemo.”
“Ask, professor.”
“You’re rich, then?”
“Infinitely rich, sir, and without any trouble, I could pay the ten-billion-franc French national debt!”
“If you don’t mind, professor,” Captain Nemo told me, “we’ll determine our exact position and fix the starting point of our voyage. It’s fifteen minutes before noon. I’m going to rise to the surface of the water.”
The captain pressed an electric bell three times. The pumps began to expel water from the ballast tanks; on the pressure gauge, a needle marked the decreasing pressures.
“Here we are,” the captain said after some time.
I made my way to the central companionway, which led to the platform. I climbed its metal steps, passed through the open hatches, and arrived topside on the Nautilus.
The platform emerged only eighty centimeters above the waves. The Nautilus could’ve been compared to a long cigar. Its sheet-iron plates resembled the scales covering the bodies of our big land reptiles. So I had a perfectly natural explanation for why this boat had always been mistaken for a marine animal.
The sea was magnificent, the skies clear. A mild breeze out of the east rippled the surface of the water. The horizon was free of all mist. There was nothing to be seen. Not a reef, not an islet. No more Abraham Lincoln. A deserted immenseness.
I took one last look at the sea, and I went below again to the main lounge. There the captain used a chronometer to calculate his longitude. Then he told me:
“Professor Aronnax, we’re in longitude 137 degrees 15’ west of the meridian of Paris, and latitude 30 degrees 7’ north, in other words, about 300 miles from the shores of Japan. And now, professor, I’ll leave you. Here are some charts on which you’ll be able to follow the course. The lounge is at your disposal.”
Captain Nemo bowed. I was left to myself, lost in my thoughts. They all centered on the Nautilus’s commander. Would I ever learn the nationality of this eccentric man? His hate for humanity—what had provoked it? Was he one of those scholars, whose careers were ruined by political revolutions? I couldn’t say yet. As for me, he had received me coolly but hospitably.
For an entire hour I was trying to probe this mystery that fascinated me so. Then my eyes focused on a huge world map displayed on the table.
Suddenly Ned Land and Conseil appeared in the lounge doorway.
“Where are we?” the Canadian exclaimed. “In the museum?”
“Begging master’s pardon,” Conseil answered, “but this seems more like the artifacts exhibition!”
“My friends,” I replied, signaling them to enter, “you’re aboard the Nautilus, fifty meters below sea level.”
“If master says so, then so be it,” Conseil answered.
“My friend, have a look, because there’s plenty of work here for a classifier of your talents.”
Ned Land questioned me about my interview with Captain Nemo. Had I discovered who he was, where he came from, where he was heading, how deep he was taking us? In short, a thousand questions I had no time to answer.
I told him everything I knew—or, rather, everything I didn’t know—and I asked him what he had seen or heard on his part.
“Haven’t seen or heard a thing!” the Canadian replied. “I haven’t even seen the crew of this boat. Could they be electric too?”
“Electric?”
“Professor Aronnax,” Ned Land said, “can’t you tell me how many men are on board? Ten, twenty, fifty, a hundred?”
“I’m unable to answer you, Mr. Land. And trust me on this: for the moment, get rid of these ideas of taking over the Nautilus or escaping from it. This boat is a masterpiece of modern technology! So keep calm, and let’s see what’s happening around us.”
“See!” the harpooner exclaimed. “There’s nothing to see, nothing we’ll ever see from this sheet-iron prison!”
Ned Land was just pronouncing these last words when we were suddenly plunged into darkness, utter darkness. The ceiling lights went out quickly.
Suddenly, daylight appeared on both sides of the lounge. The liquid masses came into view. We were separated from the sea by two panes of glass.
The sea was clearly visible for a one-mile radius around the Nautilus. What a sight! What pen could describe it?
“You wanted to see something, Ned my friend; well, now you have something to see!”
“How unusual!” the Canadian said. “Such a sight!”
Suddenly daylight appeared in the lounge. The sheet-iron panels slid shut. The magical vision disappeared. The compass still showed our heading as east-northeast, the pressure gauge indicated a pressure of five atmospheres (corresponding to a depth of fifty meters), and the our speed was fifteen miles per hour.
I waited for Captain Nemo. But he didn’t appear. The clock marked the hour of five.
Ned Land and Conseil returned to their cabin. As for me, I went to my stateroom. There I found dinner ready for me. I spent the evening in reading, writing, and thinking. Then drowsiness overtook me, and I fell into a deep slumber.
The next day, November 9, I woke up only after a long, twelve-hour slumber. Conseil came to ask how my night went and to offer his services. He had left his Canadian friend sleeping.
I was concerned about Captain Nemo’s absence during our session the previous afternoon, and I hoped to see him again today.
Soon I had put on my clothes, which were woven from strands of seashell tissue. As soon as I was dressed, I made my way to the main lounge. It was deserted.
The entire day passed without a visit from Captain Nemo. The panels in the lounge didn’t open. The Nautilus kept heading east-northeast, a speed of twelve miles per hour, and a depth between fifty and sixty meters.
Next day, November 10: the same neglect, the same solitude. I didn’t see a soul from the crew. Ned and Conseil spent the better part of the day with me. They were astonished at the captain’s inexplicable absence. Was this eccentric man ill? Did he want to change his plans concerning us?
But after all, as Conseil noted, we enjoyed complete freedom, and were abundantly fed. We couldn’t complain, and moreover we had no grounds for criticism.
That day I started my diary of these adventures, which has enabled me to narrate them with the most scrupulous accuracy; and one odd detail: I wrote it on paper manufactured from marine eelgrass.
Early in the morning on November 11, fresh air poured through the Nautilus’s interior, informing me that we had returned to the surface of the ocean to renew our oxygen supply. I headed for the central companionway and climbed onto the platform.
It was six o’clock. I found the sea gray but calm. I inhaled the sea’s salty aroma with great pleasure.I hoped to encounter Captain Nemo there—would he come?
Little by little, the mists were dispersed under the action of the sun’s rays. The radiant orb cleared the eastern horizon. I was marveling at this delightful sunrise, so life-giving and cheerful, when I heard someone climbing onto the platform.
I was prepared to greet Captain Nemo, but it was his chief officer who appeared—whom I had already met during our first visit with the captain. He advanced over the platform. He scrutinized every point of the horizon with the utmost care. Then he pronounced a phrase. I remember it because, every morning, it was repeated under the same circumstances:
“Nautron respoc lorni virch.”
What it meant I was unable to say.
Then the chief officer went below again. I went down the hatch and back through the gangways to my stateroom.
Five days passed in this way with no change in our situation. Every morning I climbed onto the platform. The same phrase was pronounced by the same individual. Captain Nemo did not appear.
On November 16, I found a note addressed to me on the table. I opened it impatiently:
Professor Aronnax
Aboard the Nautilus
November 16, 1867
Captain Nemo invites Professor Aronnax on a hunting trip that will take place tomorrow morning in his Crespo Island forests. He hopes nothing will prevent the professor from attending, and he looks forward with pleasure to the professor’s companions joining him.
Captain Nemo,Commander of the Nautilus.
“A hunting trip!” Ned exclaimed.
“And in his forests on Crespo Island!” Conseil added.
“But does this mean he goes ashore?” Ned Land went on. “Well, we’ve got to accept! Once we’re on solid ground, we’ll figure out a course of action.”
“First let’s look into this Crespo Island!” I replied.
I consulted the world map; and I found an islet, which old Spanish charts called Rocca de la Plata, in other words, “Silver Rock.” It is a small rock in the middle of the north Pacific.
“If Captain Nemo sometimes goes ashore,” I said, “he picks desert islands!”
Ned Land shook his head without replying; then he and Conseil left me. After supper, I fell asleep.
When I woke up the next day, November 17, I sensed that the Nautilus was completely motionless. I dressed hurriedly and entered the main lounge.
Captain Nemo was there waiting for me. He stood up, bowed, and asked if it suited me to come along.
“Sir,” I asked, “how is it that you’ve severed all ties with the shore, yet you own forests on Crespo Island?”
“Professor,” the captain answered me, “these forests of mine aren’t frequented by lions, tigers, panthers, or other quadrupeds. They’re known only to me. They grow only for me. These forests aren’t on land, they’re actual underwater forests.”
“Underwater forests!” I exclaimed.
“Yes, professor.”
“And you’re offering to take me to them?”
“Precisely.”
“On foot?”
“Without getting your feet wet.”
“While hunting?”
“While hunting.”
“Rifles in hand?”
“Rifles in hand.”
Captain Nemo invited me to follow him. We arrived at the dining room, where we found breakfast served.
“Professor Aronnax,” the captain told me, “I beg you to share my breakfast without formality. We can chat while we eat.”
The meal was made up of various fish and some slices of sea cucumber, all garnished with seaweed. Our beverage consisted of clear water to which, following the captain’s example, I added some drops of a liquor.
At first Captain Nemo ate without pronouncing a single word. Then he told me:
“Professor, when I proposed that you go hunting in my Crespo forests, you thought I was contradicting myself. When I informed you that it was an issue of underwater forests, you thought I’d gone insane.”
“But, captain, believe me—”
“Kindly listen to me, and you’ll see if you have grounds for accusing me of insanity or self-contradiction. Professor, you know as well as I do that a man can live underwater so long as he carries with him his own supply of breathable air. For underwater work projects, the workman wears a waterproof suit with his head imprisoned in a metal capsule.”
“That’s the standard equipment for a diving suit,” I said.
“Correct, but under such conditions the man has no freedom. He’s attached to a pump that sends him air through a rubber hose; it’s an actual chain that fetters him to the shore, and if we were to be bound in this way to the Nautilus, we couldn’t go far either.”
“Then how do you break free?” I asked.
“We use the special device, invented by two of your fellow countrymen but refined by me for my own special uses. It consists of a tank built from heavy sheet iron in which I store air under a pressure of fifty atmospheres. This tank is fastened to the back by means of straps, like a soldier’s knapsack. Its top part forms a box where the air is regulated by a bellows mechanism and can be released only at its proper tension.”
“And what about the rifle?”
“It isn’t a rifle that uses gunpowder,” the captain replied.
“Then it’s an air gun?”
“Surely. How can I make gunpowder on my ship? With this rifle every shot is fatal; and as soon as the animal is hit, it falls as if struck by lightning.”
Captain Nemo led me to the Nautilus’s stern, and, passing by Ned and Conseil’s cabin, I summoned my two companions, who instantly followed us. Then we arrived at a cell located within easy access of the engine room; in this cell we were to get dressed for our stroll.
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