A Journey to the Interior of the Earth

CHAPTER XVI.

BOLD­LY DOWN THE CRATER

Sup­per was rapid­ly de­voured, and the lit­tle com­pa­ny housed them­selves as best they could. The bed was hard, the shel­ter not very sub­stan­tial, and our po­si­tion an anx­ious one, at five thou­sand feet above the 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 with the light of a splen­did sun. I rose from my gran­ite bed and went out to en­joy the mag­nif­icent spec­ta­cle that lay un­rolled be­fore me.

I stood on the very sum­mit of the south­ern­most of Snæfell’s peaks. The range of the eye ex­tend­ed over the whole is­land. By an op­ti­cal law which ob­tains at all great heights, the shores seemed raised and the cen­tre de­pressed. It seemed as if one of Helbesmer’s raised maps lay at my feet. I could see deep val­leys in­ter­sect­ing each oth­er in ev­ery di­rec­tion, precipices like low walls, lakes re­duced to ponds, rivers ab­bre­vi­at­ed in­to streams. On my right were num­ber­less glaciers and in­nu­mer­able peaks, some plumed with feath­ery clouds of smoke. The un­du­lat­ing sur­face of these end­less moun­tains, crest­ed with sheets of snow, re­mind­ed one of a stormy sea. If I looked west­ward, there the ocean lay spread out in all its mag­nif­icence, like a mere con­tin­ua­tion of those flock-​like sum­mits. The eye could hard­ly tell where the snowy ridges end­ed and the foam­ing waves be­gan.

I was thus steeped in the mar­vel­lous ec­sta­sy which all high sum­mits de­vel­op in the mind; and now with­out gid­di­ness, for I was be­gin­ning to be ac­cus­tomed to these sub­lime as­pects of na­ture. My daz­zled eyes were bathed in the bright flood of the so­lar rays. I was for­get­ting where and who I was, to live the life of elves and sylphs, the fan­ci­ful cre­ation of Scan­di­na­vian su­per­sti­tions. I felt in­tox­icat­ed with the sub­lime plea­sure of lofty el­eva­tions with­out think­ing of the pro­found abysses in­to which I was short­ly to be plunged. But I was brought back to the re­al­ities of things by the ar­rival of Hans and the Pro­fes­sor, who joined me on the sum­mit.

My un­cle point­ed out to me in the far west a light steam or mist, a sem­blance of land, which bound­ed the dis­tant hori­zon of wa­ters.

“Green­land!” said he.

“Green­land?” I cried.

“Yes; we are on­ly thir­ty-​five leagues from it; and dur­ing thaws the white bears, borne by the ice fields from the north, are car­ried even in­to Ice­land. But nev­er mind that. Here we are at the top of Snæfell and here are two peaks, one north and one south. Hans will tell us the name of that on which we are now stand­ing.”

The ques­tion be­ing put, Hans replied:

“Scar­taris.”

My un­cle shot a tri­umphant glance at me.

“Now for the crater!” he cried.

The crater of Snæfell re­sem­bled an in­vert­ed cone, the openingof which might be half a league in di­am­eter. Its depth ap­peared to be about two thou­sand feet. Imag­ine the as­pect of such a reser­voir, brim full and run­ning over with liq­uid fire amid the rolling thun­der. The bot­tom of the fun­nel was about 250 feet in cir­cuit, so that the gen­tle slope al­lowed its low­er brim to be reached with­out much dif­fi­cul­ty. In­vol­un­tar­ily I com­pared the whole crater to an enor­mous erect­ed mor­tar, and the com­par­ison put me in a ter­ri­ble fright.

“What mad­ness,” I thought, “to go down in­to a mor­tar, per­haps a load­ed mor­tar, to be shot up in­to the air at a mo­ment’s no­tice!”

But I did not try to back out of it. Hans with per­fect cool­ness re­sumed the lead, and I fol­lowed him with­out a word.

In or­der to fa­cil­itate the de­scent, Hans wound his way down the cone by a spi­ral path. Our route lay amidst erup­tive rocks, some of which, shak­en out of their loos­ened beds, rushed bound­ing down the abyss, and in their fall awoke echoes re­mark­able for their loud and well-​de­fined sharp­ness.

In cer­tain parts of the cone there were glaciers. Here Hans ad­vanced on­ly with ex­treme pre­cau­tion, sound­ing his way with his iron-​point­ed pole, to dis­cov­er any crevass­es in it. At par­tic­ular­ly du­bi­ous pas­sages we were obliged to con­nect our­selves with each oth­er by a long cord, in or­der that any man who missed his foot­ing might be held up by his com­pan­ions. This sol­id for­ma­tion was pru­dent, but did not re­move all dan­ger.

Yet, notwith­stand­ing the dif­fi­cul­ties of the de­scent, down steeps 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 ar­rived. I raised my head and saw straight above me the up­per aper­ture of the cone, fram­ing a bit of sky of very small cir­cum­fer­ence, but al­most per­fect­ly round. Just up­on the edge ap­peared the snowy peak of Saris, stand­ing out sharp and clear against end­less space.

At the bot­tom of the crater were three chim­neys, through which, in its erup­tions, Snæfell had driv­en forth fire and la­va from its cen­tral fur­nace. Each of these chim­neys was a hun­dred feet in di­am­eter. They gaped be­fore us right in our path. I had not the courage to look down ei­ther of them. But Pro­fes­sor Lieden­brock had hasti­ly sur­veyed all three; he was pant­ing, run­ning from one to the oth­er, ges­tic­ulat­ing, and ut­ter­ing in­co­her­ent ex­pres­sions. Hans and his com­rades, seat­ed up­on loose la­va rocks, looked at him with as­much won­der as they knew how to ex­press, and per­haps tak­ing him for an es­caped lu­natic.

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, with arms out­stretched and legs strad­dling wide apart, erect be­fore a gran­ite rock that stood in the cen­tre of the crater, just like a pedestal made ready to re­ceive a stat­ue of Plu­to. He stood like a man stu­pe­fied, but the stu­pe­fac­tion soon gave way to deliri­ous rap­ture.

“Ax­el, Ax­el,” he cried. “Come, come!”

I ran. Hans and the Ice­landers nev­er stirred.

“Look!” cried the Pro­fes­sor.

And, shar­ing his as­ton­ish­ment, but I think not his joy, I read on the west­ern face of the block, in Runic char­ac­ters, half moul­dered away with lapse of ages, this thrice-​ac­cursed name:

[At this point a Runic text ap­pears]

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

I made no an­swer; and I re­turned in si­lence to my la­va seat in a state of ut­ter speech­less con­ster­na­tion. Here was crush­ing ev­idence.

How long I re­mained plunged in ag­oniz­ing re­flec­tions I can­not tell; all that I know is, that on rais­ing 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 Snæfell to re­turn to Stapi.

Hans slept peace­ably at the foot of a rock, in a la­va bed, where he had found a suit­able couch for him­self; but my un­cle was pac­ing around the bot­tom of the crater like a wild beast in a cage. I had nei­ther the wish nor the strength to rise, and fol­low­ing the guide’s ex­am­ple I went off in­to an un­hap­py slum­ber, fan­cy­ing I could hear omi­nous nois­es or feel trem­blings with­in the re­cess­es of the moun­tain.

Thus the first night in the crater passed away.

The next morn­ing, a grey, heavy, cloudy sky seemed to droop over the sum­mit of the cone. I did not know this first from the ap­pear­ances of na­ture, but I found it out by my un­cle’s im­petu­ous wrath.

I soon found out the cause, and hope dawned again in my heart. For this rea­son.

Of the three ways open be­fore us, one had been tak­en by Saknussemm. The in­di­ca­tions of the learned Ice­lander hint­ed at in the cryp­togram, point­ed to this fact that the shad­ow of Scar­taris came to touch that par­tic­ular way dur­ing the lat­ter days of the month of June.

That sharp peak might hence be con­sid­ered as the gnomon of a vast sun di­al, the shad­ow pro­ject­ed from which on a cer­tain day would point out the road to the cen­tre of the earth.

Now, no sun no shad­ow, and there­fore no guide. Here was June 25. If the sun was cloud­ed for six days we must post­pone our vis­it till next year.

My lim­it­ed pow­ers of de­scrip­tion would fail, were I to at­tempt a pic­ture of the Pro­fes­sor’s an­gry im­pa­tience. The day wore on, and no shad­ow came to lay it­self along the bot­tom of the crater. Hans did not move from the spot he had se­lect­ed; yet he must be ask­ing him­self what were we wait­ing for, if he asked him­self any­thing at all. My un­cle spoke not a word to me. His gaze, ev­er di­rect­ed up­wards, was lost in the grey and misty space be­yond.

On the 26th noth­ing yet. Rain min­gled with snow was falling all day long. Hans built a but of pieces of la­va. I felt a ma­li­cious plea­sure in watch­ing the thou­sand rills and cas­cades that came tum­bling down the sides of the cone, and the deaf­en­ing con­tin­uous din awaked by ev­ery stone against which they bound­ed.

My un­cle’s rage knew no bounds. It was enough to ir­ri­tate a meek­er man than he; for it was founder­ing al­most with­in the port.

But Heav­en nev­er sends un­mixed grief, and for Pro­fes­sor Lieden­brock there was a sat­is­fac­tion in store pro­por­tioned to his des­per­ate anx­ieties.

The next day the sky was again over­cast; but on the 29th of June, the last day but one of the month, with the change of the moon came a change of weath­er. The sun poured a flood of light down the crater. Ev­ery hillock, ev­ery rock and stone, ev­ery pro­ject­ing sur­face, had its share of the beam­ing tor­rent, and threw its shad­ow on the ground. Amongst them all, Scar­taris laid down his sharp-​point­ed an­gu­lar shad­ow which be­gan to move slow­ly in the op­po­site di­rec­tion to that of the ra­di­ant orb.

My un­cle turned too, and fol­lowed it.

At noon, be­ing at its least ex­tent, it came and soft­ly fell up­on the edge of the mid­dle chim­ney.

“There it is! there it is!” shout­ed the Pro­fes­sor.

“Now for the cen­tre of the globe!” he added in Dan­ish.

I looked at Hans, to hear what he would say.

“_Forüt!_” was his tran­quil an­swer.

“For­ward!” replied my un­cle.

It was thir­teen min­utes past one.