A Journey To The Center Of The Earth Part 8

We could see the two peaks boldly projected against the dark grey sky.

Three exhausting hours of walking had only brought us to the base of the mountain. There Hans signaled to us to stop, and a hasty breakfast was divided up among us. My uncle swallowed two mouthfuls at a time to get on faster. But whether he liked it or not, this was a rest as well as a breakfast hour, and he had to wait until it pleased our guide to move on, he gave the signal for departure after an hour. The three Icelanders, just as taciturn as their comrade the hunter, did not say a single word and ate soberly.

We were now beginning to scale the steep sides of Snaefells. Through an optical illusion that occurs frequently in the mountains, its snowy summit appeared very close; and yet, how many long hours it took to reach! And above all, what exhaustion! The rocks, not tied together by any connection of soil or plants, rolled away from under our feet and lost themselves in the plain with the speed of an avalanche.

In some places the flanks of the mountain formed an angle of at least 36 degrees with the horizon; it was impossible to climb them, and we had to walk around these stony slopes, not without difficulty. We helped each other with our sticks.

I must admit that my uncle kept as close to me as he could; he never lost sight of me, and on many occasions his arm provided me with powerful support. He himself seemed to possess an innate sense of balance, for he never stumbled. The Icelanders, though they were burdened, climbed with the agility of mountaineers.

Judging by the distant appearance of the summit of Snaefells, it seemed impossible to me to reach it from on our side, if the angle of the slopes did not diminish. Fortunately, after an hour of exhaustion and exertions, a kind of staircase appeared unexpectedly in the midst of the vast snow cover on the back of the volcano, which greatly facilitated our ascent. It originated from one of those torrents of stones thrown up by eruptions that are called 'stina' by the Icelanders. If this torrent had not been checked in its fall by the shape of the mountain sides, it would have fallen into the sea and formed new islands.

Such as it was, it served us well. The steepness increased, but these stone steps allowed us to climb up easily, and even so quickly that, having rested for a moment while my companions continued their ascent, I perceived them already reduced to microscopic dimensions by the distance.

At seven in the evening, we had ascended the two thousand steps of this grand staircase, and we had attained a bulge in the mountain, a kind of bed on which the cone proper of the crater rested.

Three thousand two hundred feet below us stretched the sea. We had pa.s.sed the limit of eternal snow, which is not very high up in Iceland because of the constant humidity of the climate. It was savagely cold. The wind blew powerfully. I was exhausted. The professor saw that my legs completely refused to do their duty, and in spite of his impatience he decided to stop. He therefore spoke to the hunter, who shook his head saying: "Ofvanfor."

"It seems we must go higher," said my uncle.

Then he asked Hans for his reason.

"Mistour," replied the guide.

"Ja Mistour," said one of the Icelanders in a tone of alarm.

"What does that word mean?" I asked uneasily.

"Look!" said my uncle.

I looked down on the plain. An immense column of pulverized pumice, sand and dust was rising up with a whirling circular motion like a waterspout; the wind was lashing it on to that side of Snaefells where we were holding on; this dense veil, hung across the sun, threw a deep shadow over the mountain. If this tornado leaned over, it would sweep us up into its whirlwinds. This phenomenon, which is not infrequent when the wind blows from the glaciers, is called in Icelandic 'mistour.'

"Hastigt! hastigt!" exclaimed our guide.

Without knowing Danish I understood at once that we must follow Hans at top speed. He began to circle round the cone of the crater, but in a diagonal direction so as to facilitate our progress. Presently the dust storm fell on the mountain, which quivered under the shock; the loose stones, caught in the blasts of wind, flew about in a hail as in an eruption. Fortunately we were on the opposite side, and sheltered from all harm. Without the guide's precaution, our torn-up bodies, shattered to smithereens, would have fallen down in the distance like the residue of an unknown meteor.

Yet Hans did not think it prudent to spend the night on the sides of the cone. We continued our zigzag climb. The fifteen hundred remaining feet took us five hours to clear; the circuitous route, the diagonal and the counter marches, must have measured at least three leagues. I could not go on; I succ.u.mbed to hunger and cold. The slightly thinner air was not enough for my lungs.

At last, at eleven o'clock, we reached the summit of Snaefells in darkness, and before going into the crater for shelter, I had time to observe the midnight sun, at its lowest point, casting its pale beams on the island sleeping at my feet.

XVI.

DINNER WAS RAPIDLY CONSUMED, and the little company housed itself as best it could. The bed was hard, the shelter insubstantial, and our situation uncomfortable at five thousand feet above sea level. Yet I slept particularly well; it was one of the best nights I had ever had, and I did not even dream.

Next morning we awoke half frozen by the sharp keen air, but in the light of a splendid sun. I rose from my granite bed and went out to enjoy the magnificent spectacle that spread out before my eyes.

I stood on the summit of the southernmost of Snaefells' peaks. From there, my view extended over the greatest part of the island. By an optical law which obtains at all great heights, the sh.o.r.es seemed raised and the center depressed. It seemed as if one of Helbesmer's relief maps lay at my feet. I could see deep valleys intersecting each other in every direction, precipices like wells, lakes reduced to ponds, rivers shortened to creeks. On my right innumerable glaciers and multiple peaks succeeded each other, some plumed with feathery clouds of smoke. The undulations of these endless mountains, whose layers of snow made them look foamy, reminded me of the surface of a stormy sea. When I turned westward, the ocean lay spread out majestically, like a continuation of these sheep-like summits. The eye could hardly tell where the earth ended and the waves began.

I plunged into the famous ecstasy that high summits create in the mind, and this time without vertigo, for I was finally getting used to these sublime contemplations. My dazzled eyes were bathed in the bright flood of the solar rays. I was forgetting who I was, where I was, and lived instead the life of elves and sylphs, imaginary inhabitants of Scandinavian mythology. I felt intoxicated by the pleasure of the heights without thinking of the abysses into which fate would soon plunge me. But I was brought back to reality by the arrival of Hans and the professor, who joined me on the summit.

My uncle, turning west, pointed out to me a light steam, a mist, a semblance of land that dominated the horizon line.

"Greenland," he said.

"Greenland?" I exclaimed.

"Yes; we're only thirty-five leagues from it; and during thaws the polar bears come all the way to Iceland, carried atop icebergs. But that doesn't matter. Here we are at the top of Snaefells, and there are two peaks, one north and one south. Hans will tell us the name of the one on which we're standing."

The question being put, Hans replied: "Scartaris."

My uncle shot a triumphant glance at me.

"To the crater!" he exclaimed.

The crater of Snaefells resembled an inverted cone, whose opening might have been half a league in diameter. Its depth appeared to be about two thousand feet. Imagine the aspect of such a container when it filled with thunder and flames. The bottom of the funnel was about 250 feet in circ.u.mference, so that its rather gentle slopes allowed its lower brim to be reached without difficulty. Involuntarily I compared the whole crater to an enormous hollow grenade launcher, and the comparison frightened me.

"What madness," I thought, "to go down into a grenade launcher when it's perhaps loaded and can go off at the slightest impact!"

But there was no way out. Hans resumed the lead with an air of indifference. I followed him without a word.

In order to make the descent easier, Hans wound his way down the cone on a spiral path. We had to walk amidst eruptive rocks, some of which, shaken out of their sockets, fell bouncing down into the abyss. Their fall gave rise to surprisingly loud echoes.

In certain parts of the cone there were glaciers. Here Hans advanced only with extreme caution, sounding his way with his iron-tipped walking stick, to discover any creva.s.ses in it. At particularly dubious pa.s.sages it was necessary to tie ourselves to each other with a long cord, so that anyone who unexpectedly lost his foothold could be held up by his companions. This solidarity was prudent, but did not eliminate all danger.

Yet, notwithstanding the difficulties of the descent, on slopes unknown to the guide, the journey was accomplished without accidents, except the loss of a coil of rope, which escaped from the hands of an Icelander, and took the shortest way to the bottom of the abyss.

At mid-day we had arrived. I raised my head and saw straight above me the upper aperture of the cone, framing a bit of sky of very small circ.u.mference, but almost perfectly round. Just on the edge appeared the snowy peak of Scartaris reaching into infinity.

At the bottom of the crater three chimneys opened up, through which Snaefells, during its eruptions, had evacuated lava and steam from its central furnace. Each of these chimneys was about a hundred feet in diameter. They gaped before us right in our path. I did not have the courage to look down into them. But Professor Lidenbrock had quickly examined all three; he was panting, running from one to the other, gesticulating, and uttering unintelligible words. Hans and his comrades, seated on pieces of lava, looked on; they clearly thought he was mad.

Suddenly my uncle uttered a cry. I thought his foot must have slipped and that he had fallen down one of the holes. But no. I saw him, arms outstretched, legs apart, standing in front of a granite rock that was placed in the center of the crater like a pedestal ready to receive a statue of Pluto.an He stood with the posture of a stunned man, but one whose amazement was rapidly giving way to irrational joy. He stood with the posture of a stunned man, but one whose amazement was rapidly giving way to irrational joy.

"Axel, Axel," he exclaimed. "Come, come!"

I ran. Hans and the Icelanders never stirred.

"Look!" said the professor.

And, sharing his astonishment, though not his joy, I read on the western face of the block, in Runic characters half eaten away by time, this thousand times accursed name:

"Arne Saknussemm!" replied my uncle. "Do you yet doubt?"

I made no answer; and I returned to my lava seat in consternation. The evidence crushed me.

How long I remained plunged into my reflections I cannot tell. All I know is that when I raised my head again, I saw only my uncle and Hans at the bottom of the crater. The Icelanders had been dismissed, and they were now descending the outer slopes of Snaefells to return to Stapi.

Hans slept peaceably at the foot of a rock, in a lava bed, where he had made an improvised bed for himself; but my uncle was pacing around the bottom of the crater like a wild beast in a trapper's pit. I had neither the wish nor the strength to rise, and following the guide's example I went off into a painful slumber, thinking I could hear noises or feel tremors in the sides of the mountain.

Thus the first night at the bottom of the crater pa.s.sed.

The next morning, a grey, heavy, cloudy sky hung over the summit of the cone. I did not realize this so much because of the darkness in the chasm as because of the rage that seized my uncle.

I understood the reason, and a glimmer of hope came back to my heart. Here is why.

Of the three routes open to us, only one had been taken by Saknussemm. According to the Icelandic scholar, one had to identify it by the detail mentioned in the cryptogram, that the shadow of Scartaris would touch its edges during the last days of the month of June.

That sharp peak might hence be considered the hand of a vast sun dial, whose shadow on a given day would indicate the path to the center of the earth.

But if there were to be no sun, no shadow. Consequently, no indicator. It was June 25. If the sky remained overcast for six days, we would have to postpone the observation to another year.

I decline to describe Professor Lidenbrock's impotent rage. The day pa.s.sed, and no shadow came to stretch along the bottom of the crater. Hans did not move from his spot; yet he must be asking himself what we were waiting for, if he asked himself anything at all. My uncle did not address a single word to me. His gaze, invariably turned to the sky, lost itself in its gray and misty hue.

On the 26th, nothing yet. Rain mingled with snow fell all day long. Hans built a hut with pieces of lava. I took a certain pleasure in watching the thousands of improvised waterfalls on the sides of the cone, where every stone increased the deafening murmur.

My uncle could no longer control himself. It was indeed enough to irritate a more patient man than him, because this was really shipwreck before leaving the port.

But Heaven always mixes great grief with great joy, and for Professor Lidenbrock there was satisfaction equal to his desperate troubles in store.

It softly brushed the edge of the middle chimney.

The next day the sky was again overcast; but on the 29th of June, the next-to-last day of the month, a change of weather came with the change of the moon. The sun poured a flood of light down the crater. Every hill, every stone, every roughness got its share of the luminous flow and instantly threw its shadow on the ground. Among them all, that of Scartaris was outlined with a sharp edge and began to move slowly in the opposite direction from that of the radiant star.

My uncle turned with it.

At noon, when it was shortest, it softly brushed the edge of the middle chimney.

"There it is! there it is!" shouted the professor. "To the center of the globe!" he added in Danish.

I looked at Hans.

"Forut!" he said quietly.

"Forward!" replied my uncle.

It was thirteen minutes past one.

XVII.

THE REAL JOURNEY BEGAN. So far our effort had overcome all difficulties, now difficulties would really spring up at every step.

I had not yet ventured to look down at the bottomless pit into which I was about to plunge. The moment had come. I could still either take my part in the venture or refuse to undertake it. But I was ashamed to withdraw in front of the hunter. Hans accepted the adventure so calmly, with such indifference and such perfect disregard for any danger that I blushed at the idea of being less brave than he. If I had been alone I might have once more tried a series of long arguments; but in the presence of the guide I held my peace; my memory flew back to my pretty Virland girl, and I approached the central chimney.

I have already mentioned that it was a hundred feet in diameter, and three hundred feet in circ.u.mference. I bent over a projecting rock and gazed down. My hair stood on end with terror. The feeling of emptiness overcame me. I felt the center of gravity shifting in me, and vertigo rising up to my brain like drunkenness. There is nothing more treacherous than this attraction toward the abyss. I was about to fall. A hand held me back. Hans'. I suppose I had not taken as many lessons in abysses as I should have at the Frelsers Kirke in Copenhagen.

But however briefly I had looked down this well, I had become aware of its structure. Its almost perpendicular walls were bristling with innumerable projections which would facilitate the descent. But if there was no lack of steps, there was still no rail. A rope fastened to the edge of the aperture would have been enough to support us. But how would we unfasten it when we arrived at the lower end?

My uncle used a very simple method to overcome this difficulty. He uncoiled a cord as thick as a finger and four hundred feet long; first he dropped half of it down, then he pa.s.sed it round a lava block that projected conveniently, and threw the other half down the chimney. Each of us could then descend by holding both halves of the rope with his hand, which would not be able to unroll itself from its hold; when we were two hundred feet down, it would be easy to retrieve the entire rope by letting one end go and pulling down by the other. Then we would start this exercise over again ad infinitum infinitum.

"Now," said my uncle, after having completed these preparations, "let's see about our loads. I'll divide them into three lots; each of us will strap one on his back. I mean only fragile articles."

The audacious professor obviously did not include us in this last category.

"Hans," he said, "will take charge of the tools and a part of the food supplies; you, Axel, will take another third of the food supplies, and the weapons; and I will take the rest of the food supplies and the delicate instruments."

"But," I said, "the clothes, and that ma.s.s of ladders and ropes, who'll take them down?"

"They'll go down by themselves."

"How so?" I asked.

"You'll see."

My uncle liked to use extreme means, without hesitation. At his order, Hans put all the unbreakable items into one package, and this packet, firmly tied up, was simply thrown down into the chasm.

I heard the loud roar of the displaced layers of air. My uncle, leaning over the abyss, followed the descent of the luggage with a satisfied look, and only rose up again when he had lost sight of it.

"Well," he said. "Now it's our turn."

I ask any sensible man if it was possible to hear those words without a shudder!

The professor tied the package of instruments to his back; Hans took the tools, myself the weapons. The descent started in the following order: Hans, my uncle, and myself. It was carried out in profound silence, broken only by the fall of loose stones into the abyss.

I let myself fall, so to speak, frantically clutching the double cord with one hand and b.u.t.tressing myself from the wall with the other with my stick. One single idea obsessed me: I feared that the rock from which I was hanging might give way. This cord seemed very fragile for supporting the weight of three people. I used it as little as possible, performing miracles of equilibrium on the lava projections which my foot tried to seize like a hand.

When one of these slippery steps shook under Hans' steps, he said in his quiet voice: "Gif akt!"

"Attention!" repeated my uncle.

In half an hour we were standing on the surface of a rock wedged in across the chimney from one side to the other.

Hans pulled the rope by one of its ends, the other rose in the air; after pa.s.sing the higher rock it came down again, bringing with it a rather dangerous shower of bits of stone and lava.

Leaning over the edge of our narrow platform, I noticed that the bottom of the hole was still invisible.

The same maneuver was repeated with the cord, and half an hour later we had descended another two hundred feet.