Books: The Mysterious Island

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"Captain Harding, will you try to escape?"

"When?" asked the engineer quickly, and it was evident that this question
was uttered without consideration, for he had not yet examined the stranger
who addressed him. But after having with a penetrating eye observed the
open face of the sailor, he was convinced that he had before him an honest
man.

"Who are you?" he asked briefly.

Pencroft made himself known.

"Well," replied Harding, "and in what way do you propose to escape?"

"By that lazy balloon which is left there doing nothing, and which looks
to me as if it was waiting on purpose for us--"

There was no necessity for the sailor to finish his sentence. The
engineer understood him at once. He seized Pencroft by the arm, and dragged
him to his house. There the sailor developed his project, which was indeed
extremely simple. They risked nothing but their lives in its execution. The
hurricane was in all its violence, it is true, but so clever and daring an
engineer as Cyrus Harding knew perfectly well how to manage a balloon. Had
he himself been as well acquainted with the art of sailing in the air as he
was with the navigation of a ship, Pencroft would not have hesitated to set
out, of course taking his young friend Herbert with him; for, accustomed to
brave the fiercest tempests of the ocean, he was not to be hindered on
account of the hurricane.

Captain Harding had listened to the sailor without saying a word, but his
eyes shone with satisfaction. Here was the long-sought-for opportunity--he
was not a man to let it pass. The plan was feasible, though, it must be
confessed, dangerous in the extreme. In the night, in spite of their
guards, they might approach the balloon, slip into the car, and then cut
the cords which held it. There was no doubt that they might be killed, but
on the other hand they might succeed, and without this storm!--Without
this storm the balloon would have started already and the looked-for
opportunity would not have then presented itself.

"I am not alone!" said Harding at last.

"How many people do you wish to bring with you?" asked the sailor.

"Two; my friend Spilett, and my servant Neb."

"That will be three," replied Pencroft; "and with Herbert and me five.
But the balloon will hold six--"

"That will be enough, we will go," answered Harding in a firm voice.

This "we" included Spilett, for the reporter, as his friend well knew,
was not a man to draw back, and when the project was communicated to him he
approved of it unreservedly. What astonished him was, that so simple an
idea had not occurred to him before. As to Neb, he followed his master
wherever his master wished to go.

"This evening, then," said Pencroft, "we will all meet out there."

"This evening, at ten o'clock," replied Captain Harding; "and Heaven
grant that the storm does not abate before our departure."

Pencroft took leave of the two friends, and returned to his lodging,
where young Herbert Brown had remained. The courageous boy knew of the
sailor's plan, and it was not without anxiety that he awaited the result of
the proposal being made to the engineer. Thus five determined persons were
about to abandon themselves to the mercy of the tempestuous elements!

No! the storm did not abate, and neither Jonathan Forster nor his
companions dreamed of confronting it in that frail car.

It would be a terrible journey. The engineer only feared one thing; it
was that the balloon, held to the ground and dashed about by the wind,
would be torn into shreds. For several hours he roamed round the nearly-
deserted square, surveying the apparatus. Pencroft did the same on his
side, his hands in his pockets, yawning now and then like a man who did not
know how to kill the time, but really dreading, like his friend, either the
escape or destruction of the balloon. Evening arrived. The night was dark
in the extreme. Thick mists passed like clouds close to the ground. Rain
fell mingled with snow. it was very cold. A mist hung over Richmond. it
seemed as if the violent storm had produced a truce between the besiegers
and the besieged, and that the cannon were silenced by the louder
detonations of the storm. The streets of the town were deserted. It had not
even appeared necessary in that horrible weather to place a guard in the
square, in the midst of which plunged the balloon. Everything favored the
departure of the prisoners, but what might possibly be the termination of
the hazardous voyage they contemplated in the midst of the furious
elements?--

"Dirty weather!" exclaimed Pencroft, fixing his hat firmly on his head
with a blow of his fist; "but pshaw, we shall succeed all the same!"

At half-past nine, Harding and his companions glided from different
directions into the square, which the gas-lamps, extinguished by the wind,
had left in total obscurity. Even the enormous balloon, almost beaten to
the ground, could not be seen. Independently of the sacks of ballast, to
which the cords of the net were fastened, the car was held by a strong
cable passed through a ring in the pavement. The five prisoners met by the
car. They had not been perceived, and such was the darkness that they could
not even see each other.

Without speaking a word, Harding, Spilett, Neb, and Herbert took their
places in the car, while Pencroft by the engineer's order detached
successively the bags of ballast. It was the work of a few minutes only,
and the sailor rejoined his companions.

The balloon was then only held by the cable, and the engineer had nothing
to do but to give the word.

At that moment a dog sprang with a bound into the car. It was Top, a
favorite of the engineer. The faithful creature, having broken his chain,
had followed his master. He, however, fearing that its additional weight
might impede their ascent, wished to send away the animal.

"One more will make but little difference, poor beast!" exclaimed
Pencroft, heaving out two bags of sand, and as he spoke letting go the
cable; the balloon ascending in an oblique direction, disappeared, after
having dashed the car against two chimneys, which it threw down as it swept
by them.

Then, indeed, the full rage of the hurricane was exhibited to the
voyagers. During the night the engineer could not dream of descending, and
when day broke, even a glimpse of the earth below was intercepted by fog.

Five days had passed when a partial clearing allowed them to see the wide
extending ocean beneath their feet, now lashed into the maddest fury by the
gale.

Our readers will recollect what befell these five daring individuals who
set out on their hazardous expedition in the balloon on the 20th of March.
Five days afterwards four of them were thrown on a desert coast, seven
thousand miles from their country! But one of their number was missing, the
man who was to be their guide, their leading spirit, the engineer, Captain
Harding! The instant they had recovered their feet, they all hurried to the
beach in the hopes of rendering him assistance.

Chapter 3

The engineer, the meshes of the net having given way, had been carried off
by a wave. His dog also had disappeared. The faithful animal had
voluntarily leaped out to help his master. "Forward," cried the reporter;
and all four, Spilett, Herbert, Pencroft, and Neb, forgetting their
fatigue, began their search. Poor Neb shed bitter tears, giving way to
despair at the thought of having lost the only being he loved on earth.

Only two minutes had passed from the time when Cyrus Harding disappeared
to the moment when his companions set foot on the ground. They had hopes
therefore of arriving in time to save him. "Let us look for him! let us
look for him!" cried Neb.

"Yes, Neb," replied Gideon Spilett, "and we will find him too!"

"Living, I trust!"

"Still living!"

"Can he swim?" asked Pencroft.

"Yes," replied Neb, "and besides, Top is there."

The sailor, observing the heavy surf on the shore, shook his head.

The engineer had disappeared to the north of the shore, and nearly half a
mile from the place where the castaways had landed. The nearest point of
the beach he could reach was thus fully that distance off.

It was then nearly six o'clock. A thick fog made the night very dark. The
castaways proceeded toward the north of the land on which chance had thrown
them, an unknown region, the geographical situation of which they could not
even guess. They were walking upon a sandy soil, mingled with stones, which
appeared destitute of any sort of vegetation. The ground, very unequal and
rough, was in some places perfectly riddled with holes, making walking
extremely painful. From these holes escaped every minute great birds of
clumsy flight, which flew in all directions. Others, more active, rose in
flocks and passed in clouds over their heads. The sailor thought he
recognized gulls and cormorants, whose shrill cries rose above the roaring
of the sea.

From time to time the castaways stopped and shouted, then listened for
some response from the ocean, for they thought that if the engineer had
landed, and they had been near to the place, they would have heard the
barking of the dog Top, even should Harding himself have been unable to
give any sign of existence. They stopped to listen, but no sound arose
above the roaring of the waves and the dashing of the surf. The little band
then continued their march forward, searching into every hollow of the
shore.

After walking for twenty minutes, the four castaways were suddenly
brought to a standstill by the sight of foaming billows close to their
feet. The solid ground ended here. They found themselves at the extremity
of a sharp point on which the sea broke furiously.

"It is a promontory," said the sailor; "we must retrace our steps,
holding towards the right, and we shall thus gain the mainland."

"But if he is there," said Neb, pointing to the ocean, whose waves shone
of a snowy white in the darkness. "Well, let us call again," and all
uniting their voices, they gave a vigorous shout, but there came no reply.
They waited for a lull, then began again; still no reply.

The castaways accordingly returned, following the opposite side of the
promontory, over a soil equally sandy and rugged. However, Pencroft
observed that the shore was more equal, that the ground rose, and he
declared that it was joined by a long slope to a hill, whose massive front
he thought that he could see looming indistinctly through the mist. The
birds were less numerous on this part of the shore; the sea was also less
tumultuous, and they observed that the agitation of the waves was
diminished. The noise of the surf was scarcely heard. This side of the
promontory evidently formed a semicircular bay, which the sharp point
sheltered from the breakers of the open sea. But to follow this direction
was to go south, exactly opposite to that part of the coast where Harding
might have landed. After a walk of a mile and a half, the shore presented
no curve which would permit them to return to the north. This promontory,
of which they had turned the point, must be attached to the mainland. The
castaways, although their strength was nearly exhausted, still marched
courageously forward, hoping every moment to meet with a sudden angle which
would set them in the first direction. What was their disappointment, when,
after trudging nearly two miles, having reached an elevated point composed
of slippery rocks, they found themselves again stopped by the sea.

"We are on an islet," said Pencroft, "and we have surveyed it from one
extremity to the other."

The sailor was right; they had been thrown, not on a continent, not even
on an island, but on an islet which was not more than two miles in length,
with even a less breadth.

Was this barren spot the desolate refuge of sea-birds, strewn with stones
and destitute of vegetation, attached to a more important archipelago? It
was impossible to say. When the voyagers from their car saw the land
through the mist, they had not been able to reconnoiter it sufficiently.
However, Pencroft, accustomed with his sailor eyes to piece through the
gloom, was almost certain that he could clearly distinguish in the west
confused masses which indicated an elevated coast. But they could not in
the dark determine whether it was a single island, or connected with
others. They could not leave it either, as the sea surrounded them; they
must therefore put off till the next day their search for the engineer,
from whom, alas! not a single cry had reached them to show that he was
still in existence.

"The silence of our friend proves nothing," said the reporter. "Perhaps
he has fainted or is wounded, and unable to reply directly, so we will not
despair."

The reporter then proposed to light a fire on a point of the islet, which
would serve as a signal to the engineer. But they searched in vain for wood
or dry brambles; nothing but sand and stones were to be found. The grief of
Neb and his companions, who were all strongly attached to the intrepid
Harding, can be better pictured than described. It was too evident that
they were powerless to help him. They must wait with what patience they
could for daylight. Either the engineer had been able to save himself, and
had already found a refuge on some point of the coast, or he was lost for
ever! The long and painful hours passed by. The cold was intense. The
castaways suffered cruelly, but they scarcely perceived it. They did not
even think of taking a minute's rest. Forgetting everything but their
chief, hoping or wishing to hope on, they continued to walk up and down on
this sterile spot, always returning to its northern point, where they could
approach nearest to the scene of the catastrophe. They listened, they
called, and then uniting their voices, they endeavored to raise even a
louder shout than before, which would be transmitted to a great distance.
The wind had now fallen almost to a calm, and the noise of the sea began
also to subside. One of Neb's shouts even appeared to produce an echo.
Herbert directed Pencroft's attention to it, adding, "That proves that
there is a coast to the west, at no great distance." The sailor nodded;
besides, his eyes could not deceive him. If he had discovered land, however
indistinct it might appear, land was sure to be there. But that distant
echo was the only response produced by Neb's shouts, while a heavy gloom
hung over all the part east of the island.

Meanwhile, the sky was clearing little by little. Towards midnight the
stars shone out, and if the engineer had been there with his companions he
would have remarked that these stars did not belong to the Northern
Hemisphere. The Polar Star was not visible, the constellations were not
those which they had been accustomed to see in the United States; the
Southern Cross glittered brightly in the sky.

The night passed away. Towards five o'clock in the morning of the 25th of
March, the sky began to lighten; the horizon still remained dark, but with
daybreak a thick mist rose from the sea, so that the eye could scarcely
penetrate beyond twenty feet or so from where they stood. At length the fog
gradually unrolled itself in great heavily moving waves.

It was unfortunate, however, that the castaways could distinguish nothing
around them. While the gaze of the reporter and Neb were cast upon the
ocean, the sailor and Herbert looked eagerly for the coast in the west. But
not a speck of land was visible. "Never mind," said Pencroft, "though I do
not see the land, I feel it... it is there... there... as sure as the fact
that we are no longer at Richmond." But the fog was not long in rising. it
was only a fine-weather mist. A hot sun soon penetrated to the surface of
the island. About half-past six, three-quarters of an hour after sunrise,
the mist became more transparent. It grew thicker above, but cleared away
below. Soon the isle appeared as if it had descended from a cloud, then the
sea showed itself around them, spreading far away towards the east, but
bounded on the west by an abrupt and precipitous coast.

Yes! the land was there. Their safety was at least provisionally insured.
The islet and the coast were separated by a channel about half a mile in
breadth, through which rushed an extremely rapid current.

However, one of the castaways, following the impulse of his heart,
immediately threw himself into the current, without consulting his
companions, without saying a single word. It was Neb. He was in haste to be
on the other side, and to climb towards the north. It had been impossible
to hold him back. Pencroft called him in vain. The reporter prepared to
follow him, but Pencroft stopped him. "Do you want to cross the channel?"
he asked. "Yes," replied Spilett. "All right!" said the seaman; "wait a
bit; Neb is well able to carry help to his master. If we venture into the
channel, we risk being carried into the open sea by the current, which is
running very strong; but, if I'm not wrong, it is ebbing. See, the tide is
going down over the sand. Let us have patience, and at low water it is
possible we may find a fordable passage." "You are right," replied the
reporter, "we will not separate more than we can help."

During this time Neb was struggling vigorously against the current. He
was crossing in an oblique direction. His black shoulders could be seen
emerging at each stroke. He was carried down very quickly, but he also made
way towards the shore. It took more than half an hour to cross from the
islet to the land, and he reached the shore several hundred feet from the
place which was opposite to the point from which he had started.

Landing at the foot of a high wall of granite, he shook himself
vigorously; and then, setting off running, soon disappeared behind a rocky
point, which projected to nearly the height of the northern extremity of
the islet.

Neb's companions had watched his daring attempt with painful anxiety, and
when he was out of sight, they fixed their attention on the land where
their hope of safety lay, while eating some shell-fish with which the sand
was strewn. It was a wretched repast, but still it was better than nothing.
The opposite coast formed one vast bay, terminating on the south by a very
sharp point, which was destitute of all vegetation, and was of a very wild
aspect. This point abutted on the shore in a grotesque outline of high
granite rocks. Towards the north, on the contrary, the bay widened, and a
more rounded coast appeared, trending from the southwest to the northeast,
and terminating in a slender cape. The distance between these two
extremities, which made the bow of the bay, was about eight miles. Half a
mile from the shore rose the islet, which somewhat resembled the carcass
of a gigantic whale. Its extreme breadth was not more than a quarter of
a mile.

Opposite the islet, the beach consisted first of sand, covered with black
stones, which were now appearing little by little above the retreating
tide. The second level was separated by a perpendicular granite cliff,
terminated at the top by an unequal edge at a height of at least 300 feet.
It continued thus for a length of three miles, ending suddenly on the right
with a precipice which looked as if cut by the hand of man. On the left,
above the promontory, this irregular and jagged cliff descended by a long
slope of conglomerated rocks till it mingled with the ground of the
southern point. On the upper plateau of the coast not a tree appeared. It
was a flat tableland like that above Cape Town at the Cape of Good Hope,
but of reduced proportions; at least so it appeared seen from the islet.
However, verdure was not wanting to the right beyond the precipice. They
could easily distinguish a confused mass of great trees, which extended
beyond the limits of their view. This verdure relieved the eye, so long
wearied by the continued ranges of granite. Lastly, beyond and above the
plateau, in a northwesterly direction and at a distance of at least seven
miles, glittered a white summit which reflected the sun's rays. It was that
of a lofty mountain, capped with snow.

The question could not at present be decided whether this land formed an
island, or whether it belonged to a continent. But on beholding the
convulsed masses heaped up on the left, no geologist would have hesitated
to give them a volcanic origin, for they were unquestionably the work of
subterranean convulsions.

Gideon Spilett, Pencroft, and Herbert attentively examined this land, on
which they might perhaps have to live many long years; on which indeed they
might even die, should it be out of the usual track of vessels, as was
likely to be the case.

"Well," asked Herbert, "what do you say, Pencroft?"

"There is some good and some bad, as in everything," replied the sailor.
"We shall see. But now the ebb is evidently making. In three hours we will
attempt the passage, and once on the other side, we will try to get out of
this scrape, and I hope may find the captain." Pencroft was not wrong in
his anticipations. Three hours later at low tide, the greater part of the
sand forming the bed of the channel was uncovered. Between the islet and
the coast there only remained a narrow channel which would no doubt be easy
to cross.

About ten o'clock, Gideon Spilett and his companions stripped themselves
of their clothes, which they placed in bundles on their heads, and then
ventured into the water, which was not more than five feet deep. Herbert,
for whom it was too deep, swam like a fish, and got through capitally. All
three arrived without difficulty on the opposite shore. Quickly drying
themselves in the sun, they put on their clothes, which they had preserved
from contact with the water, and sat down to take counsel together what to
do next.

Chapter 4

All at once the reporter sprang up, and telling the sailor that he would
rejoin them at that same place, he climbed the cliff in the direction which
the Negro Neb had taken a few hours before. Anxiety hastened his steps, for
he longed to obtain news of his friend, and he soon disappeared round an
angle of the cliff. Herbert wished to accompany him.

"Stop here, my boy," said the sailor; "we have to prepare an encampment,
and to try and find rather better grub than these shell-fish. Our friends
will want something when they come back. There is work for everybody."

"I am ready," replied Herbert.

"All right," said the sailor; "that will do. We must set about it
regularly. We are tired, cold, and hungry; therefore we must have shelter,
fire, and food. There is wood in the forest, and eggs in nests; we have
only to find a house."

"Very well," returned Herbert, "I will look for a cave among the rocks,
and I shall be sure to discover some hole into which we can creep."

"All right," said Pencroft; "go on, my boy."

They both walked to the foot of the enormous wall over the beach, far
from which the tide had now retreated; but instead of going towards the
north, they went southward. Pencroft had remarked, several hundred feet
from the place at which they landed, a narrow cutting, out of which he
thought a river or stream might issue. Now, on the one hand it was
important to settle themselves in the neighborhood of a good stream of
water, and on the other it was possible that the current had thrown Cyrus
Harding on the shore there.

The cliff, as has been said, rose to a height of three hundred feet, but
the mass was unbroken throughout, and even at its base, scarcely washed by
the sea, it did not offer the smallest fissure which would serve as a
dwelling. It was a perpendicular wall of very hard granite, which even the
waves had not worn away. Towards the summit fluttered myriads of sea-fowl,
and especially those of the web-footed species with long, flat, pointed
beaks--a clamorous tribe, bold in the presence of man, who probably for the
first time thus invaded their domains. Pencroft recognized the skua and
other gulls among them, the voracious little sea-mew, which in great
numbers nestled in the crevices of the granite. A shot fired among this
swarm would have killed a great number, but to fire a shot a gun was
needed, and neither Pencroft nor Herbert had one; besides this, gulls and
sea-mews are scarcely eatable, and even their eggs have a detestable taste.
However, Herbert, who had gone forward a little more to the left, soon came
upon rocks covered with sea-weed, which, some hours later, would be hidden
by the high tide. On these rocks, in the midst of slippery wrack, abounded
bivalve shell-fish, not to be despised by starving people. Herbert called
Pencroft, who ran up hastily.

"Here are mussels!" cried the sailor; "these will do instead of eggs!"

"They are not mussels," replied Herbert, who was attentively examining
the molluscs attached to the rocks; "they are lithodomes."

"Are they good to eat?" asked Pencroft.

"Perfectly so."

"Then let us eat some lithodomes."

The sailor could rely upon Herbert; the young boy was well up in natural
history, and always had had quite a passion for the science. His father had
encouraged him in it, by letting him attend the lectures of the best
professors in Boston, who were very fond of the intelligent, industrious
lad. And his turn for natural history was, more than once in the course of
time, of great use, and he was not mistaken in this instance. These
lithodomes were oblong shells, suspended in clusters and adhering very
tightly to the rocks. They belong to that species of molluscous perforators
which excavate holes in the hardest stone; their shell is rounded at both
ends, a feature which is not remarked in the common mussel.