The Adventures of Captain Hatteras quotes

“There’s nothing but boldness about the ship,” continued Cornhill, well pleased with himself. “

The Forward⁠—forward to what? Without saying that nobody knows who her captain is.

”

Dr. Clawbonny was very enthusiastic about it; he took possession of his cabin on the 6th of February, the day after the ship was launched.

“The happiest animal in the world,” he used to say, “would be a snail who could make himself just such a shell as he wanted; I shall try to be an intelligent snail.”

And, in fact, for a shell which he was not going to leave for some time, his cabin presented a very comfortable appearance; the doctor took a scientific or childlike pleasure in arranging his scientific paraphernalia.

They used to crowd there in great numbers, so that even so good-natured a man as the doctor was occasionally put out; and, like Socrates, he came at last to say—

“My house is small, but may Heaven grant that it never be filled with friends!”

To complete our account of the Forward, it is only necessary to add that a kennel for the huge Danish dog was built just beneath the window of the closed cabin; but he preferred to keep himself between decks and in the hold;

“But what is the explanation of it, Doctor?”

“It’s very simple; there is no explanation.”

At that moment the ice-master, who was on watch in the topmast cross-trees, cried out that there was a floating mass on the starboard quarter, about fifteen miles to windward.

“But it’s true; so I have no need to be surprised, now that we are two degrees farther north, at our sighting an iceberg.”

“You are bottled full of information, Doctor,” answered the commander; “one needs only draw the cork.”

“Very well, I shall be exhausted sooner than you think; and now, Shandon, if we can get a nearer view of this phenomenon, I should be the gladdest of doctors.”

“If I were not a Frenchman, I should like to be an Englishman.”

“If I were not an Englishman, I should like to be an Englishman!”

That retort points the nature of the man.

“The first man who lays a finger on me—” he cried, seizing a handspike, which he flourished about his head.

“Pen,” he said very quietly, “if you move hand or foot, I shall blow your brains out!”

With these words he drew a revolver and aimed it at the sailor.

“That Pen is a worthless fellow,” the doctor said to him.

“No man was ever nearer death,” answered the captain, simply.

Soon there was enough steam on; the anchors of the Forward were raised; and the brig started eastward, heading for Point Beecher, and cutting through the newly formed ice.

“Well,” the doctor used invariably to answer—if necessary he could have invented confidence—“we shall get there, Captain, but, it is true, at the ninety-ninth meridian instead of the seventy-fifth; but what difference does that make?

If every road leads to Rome, it is even surer that every meridian leads to the Pole.

”

The noise increased immensely. Duke barked angrily at these new enemies. The darkness of the night added to the horrors of the situation, without hiding the ice which glowed in the last light of the evening.

Hatteras’s orders sounded above all this strange, impossible, supernatural conflict of the men with the ice.

The ship, yielding to this enormous pressure, inclined to larboard, and the end of the main-yard was already touching the ice, at the risk of breaking the mast.

Thus was permission given them. Johnson and Bell hastened to the deck.

Hatteras heard the wood of the brig crashing under the axe, and wept.

That was Christmas Day, the great family festival in England, one specially devoted to the amusement of the children. What a painful recollection was that of the happy children gathered about the green Christmas tree!

The doctor and Bell looked at him in terror.

Supported by his long staff, he seemed like the genius of these regions, straight in the midst of the fierce blast, and terrible in his stern severity.

He remained standing, without stirring, till the first rays of the twilight appeared, bold and unconquerable, and seeming to defy the tempest which was roaring about him.

At that moment the doctor and Bell came up to Hatteras. He roused himself suddenly from his despair.

“My friends,” he said energetically, “the cowards have taken flight! The brave will succeed! Johnson, Bell, you are bold; Doctor, you are wise; as for me, I have faith! There is the North Pole! Come, to work!”

Hatteras’s companions felt their hearts glow at these brave words.

“Poor ship!” said the doctor, sighing; “I had become attached to it; I had got to look on it as on my own home, and there’s not left a piece that can be recognized!”

“Who would think, Doctor, that this mass of dust and ashes could be so dear to our heart?”

“And the launch,” continued the doctor, gazing around, “was it destroyed too?”

“Johnson,” answered the doctor, mildly, “we must remember that their suffering had worn upon them very much.

Only exceptional natures remain stanch in adversity, which completely overthrows the weak.

Let us rather pity than curse them!”

And yet are there not Eskimo near the Pole, as well as at Smith’s Sound? That open sea, of which the existence is uncertain, ought to surround a continent.

Nature is logical in everything it does.

Well, we ought to believe that vegetation appears when the greatest cold ceases. Is there not a promised land awaiting us at the north, and which you want to fly from without hope of return?”

Its rays threw out a light which was reflected from the ice; towards the northwest the ice-field looked like a perfectly smooth plain; not a hummock was to be seen. This part of the sea seemed to have frozen smooth like a lake.

It was an immense, monotonous desert.

Such was the impression that this spectacle made on the doctor’s mind, and he spoke of it to his companion.

“What can he do in such circumstances?” retorted Bell, shrugging his shoulders.

“Can he change these pieces of ice into pieces of meat? Is he a god, who can work by miracles?”

“Who can say?” the boatswain answered his companion’s doubts; “I trust in him.”

“No, my friend,” answered the doctor,

“I am only a man with a good memory, who has read a good deal.”

“Why, what do you mean?”

And that was generally felt. Either from policy or instinctively, Altamont was at first attracted towards the doctor; it was to him he owed his life, but it was sympathy rather than gratitude which moved him.

This was the invariable effect of Clawbonny’s nature; friends grew about him like wheat under the summer sun.

Everyone has heard of people who rise at five o’clock in the morning to make enemies; the doctor could have got up at four without doing it.

it was to him he owed his life, but it was sympathy rather than gratitude which moved him. This was the invariable effect of Clawbonny’s nature; friends grew about him like wheat under the summer sun.

Everyone has heard of people who rise at five o’clock in the morning to make enemies; the doctor could have got up at four without doing it.

Nevertheless, he resolved to profit by Altamont’s friendship to the extent of learning the real reason of his presence in the polar seas. But with all his wordiness the American answered without answering, and kept repeating what he had to say about the Northwest Passage.

It was a noteworthy sight, these sparkling rays, rivalling the brilliancy of the plains, and defining sharply the outlines of the surrounding objects. Johnson could not help clapping his hands.

“Dr. Clawbonny,” he said, “has made another sun!”

“One ought to do a little of everything,” answered the doctor, modestly.

“Then,” said the American, “I can’t guess.”

“Well,” answered the doctor, smiling, “if we couldn’t get out of this little affair, what would be the use of physics?”

“Ah!” said Johnson, brightening up, “physics!”

“It must be said,” continued Altamont, “that we are going through an uninhabited and uninhabitable country.”

“Oh, uninhabitable is a strong word!” answered the doctor; “I can’t believe any land uninhabitable; man, by many sacrifices, and for generations using all the resources of science, might finally fertilize such a country.”

“Do you think so?” asked Altamont.

their wool-like fur was already losing its winter whiteness in favor of the summer brown and gray; they seemed no more timid than the hares and birds of the country.

Such were the relations of the first men to the first animals in the early ages of the world.

The hunters reached the middle of the band without anyone flying; this time the doctor found it hard to restrain the instincts of Altamont, who could not calmly look on this game without a thirst for blood rising in his brain.

“Why not,” answered Altamont, “if they have never seen men?”

“Because they are naturally ferocious, and ferocity, like maliciousness, begets suspicion; a remark which is true of man as well as of animals. A wicked man is distrustful, and fear is commonly found in those who are able to inspire it.”

This little lesson in natural philosophy ended the conversation.

The second ox fell back dead.

Hatteras was saved. He owed his life to the man whom he detested most in the world.

What was going on in his mind at this time? What emotion was there which he could not master? That is one of the secrets of the heart which defy all analysis.

“Yes, Dr. Clawbonny,” answered the boatswain.

“Well, I’ve brought back two brothers.”

The two sailors gladly shook Altamont’s hand; the doctor told them what the American captain had done for the English captain, and that night the snow-house held five perfectly happy men.

Broad pools appeared here and there, often almost as large as lakes. They would walk in up to their waists very often; but they only laughed at it, and the doctor more than any.

“Water has no right to wet us in this country,” he used to say; “it ought to appear only as a solid, or a gas; as to its being liquid, it’s absurd! Ice or vapor will do, but water won’t!”

They did not forget their shooting, for thereby they got fresh meat. So Altamont and Bell, without going very far away, scoured the neighboring ravines; they brought back ptarmigan, geese, and a few gray rabbits. Gradually these animals became very shy and hard to approach.

This clearness let them see down into immeasurable depths; it seemed as if the sea were lit up like a large aquarium; probably some electric phenomenon at the bottom of the sea lit it up.

So the launch seemed hung in a bottomless abyss.

On the surface of the water the birds were flying in large flocks, like thick clouds big with a storm.

“This is a storm we hardly expected,” said Altamont, holding fast to his bench.

“We ought to expect anything here,” answered the doctor.

These remarks were made amid the roar of the tempest and the hissing of the waves, which the violence of the wind reduced to a fine spray. It was nearly impossible for one to hear his neighbor.

It was nearly impossible for one to hear his neighbor. It was hard to keep the boat’s head to the north; the clouds hid everything a few fathoms from the boat, and they had no mark to sail by.

This sudden tempest, just as they were about attaining their object, seemed full of warning; to their excited minds it came like an order to go no farther.

Did Nature forbid approach to the Pole? Was this point of the globe surrounded by hurricanes and tempests which rendered access impossible?

a rock, reef, or piece of ice might at any moment rise before them, and crush them to atoms. Still, no one of these men raised a single objection, nor suggested prudence.

They were seized with the madness of danger. Thirst for the unknown took possession of them.

They were going along, not blinded, but blindly, finding their speed only too slow for their impatience. Hatteras held the tiller firm amid the waves lashed into foam by the tempest. Still the proximity of land became evident. Strange signs filled the air.

Every now and then the launch leaned to one side, so that almost her whole keel was exposed; still she obeyed her rudder, and rose like a stumbling horse which his rider brings up by spur and reins.

Hatteras, with his hair flying and his hand on the tiller, seemed to be part of the boat, like horse and man at the time of the centaurs.

Suddenly a terrible sight presented itself to their eyes. Within less than ten fathoms a floe was balancing on the waves; it fell and rose like the launch, threatening in its fall to crush it to atoms.

He showed that these animals used to live in rather high latitudes, and that the streams and rivers simply carried their bodies to the places where they were found. But do you know the explanation which scientific men gave before this one?”

“Scientific men are capable of anything,” said Altamont.

“Yes, in explanation of a fact; well, they imagined that the Pole used to be at the equator and the equator at the Pole.”

“They said it was due to the shock of collision with a comet. The comet is the deus ex machina; whenever one comes to a difficult question in cosmography, a comet is lugged in.

It is the most obliging of the heavenly bodies, and at the least sign from a scientific man it disarranges itself to arrange everything.

”

“They said it was due to the shock of collision with a comet.

The comet is the deus ex machina; whenever one comes to a difficult question in cosmography, a comet is lugged in.

It is the most obliging of the heavenly bodies, and at the least sign from a scientific man it disarranges itself to arrange everything.”

but in consequence of the phenomenon I have just described, it has an ellipsoidal form, and points at the pole are nearer the centre of the earth than points at the equator by about five leagues.”

“So,” said Johnson, “if our captain wanted to take us to the centre of the earth, we should have five leagues less to go?”

“Well, Captain, it’s so much gained! We ought to avail ourselves of it.”

“Oh, in the sun I should weigh more than five thousand pounds!”

“Heavens!” said Bell; “you’d need a derrick to move your legs.”

“Probably,” answered the doctor, laughing at Bell’s amazement; “but here the difference is imperceptible, and by an equal effort of the muscles Bell would leap as high as on the docks at Liverpool.”