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Journey to the Center of the Earth
Chapter 19. THE WESTERN GALLERY. A NEW ROUTE
Our descent was now resumed by means of the second gallery.
Hans took up his post in front as usual.
We hadn't gone more than a hundred yards when the Professor carefully examined the walls.
"This is the primitive formation, we're on the right road, onwards is our hope!"
In the first hours of the world's morning, the whole earth cooled and its volume reduced.
This caused breakage in the upper crust, with ruptures, crevices and fissures.
The passage was a fissure of this kind, through which, ages ago, had flowed eruptive granite.
The thousand windings and turnings formed an inextricable maze through the ancient soil.
As we went down, layers that make up the primitive soil appeared with the greatest detail.
Geological science sees this primitive soil as the base of the mineral crust.
And it has shown that it's made of three different layers, all resting on the fixed rock known as granite.
No mineralogists had ever been placed in such a wonderful position to study nature in all her real and naked beauty.
The sounding rod, a simple machine, couldn't bring to the surface of the earth the objects needed for the study of its internal structure.
We were about to see them with our own eyes and to touch them with our own hands.
Remember that I'm writing this after the journey.
Across the streak of rocks, colored by beautiful green tones, ran metallic threads of copper and manganese, with traces of platinum and gold.
I couldn't help looking at these riches buried in the entrails of Mother Earth, and that no man would enjoy to the end of time.
These mighty, endless treasures were buried in the earth's morning at such depths that no crowbar or pickaxe will ever reach them.
The light of our Ruhmkorff's coil, increased tenfold by the many prismatic masses of rock, sent its jets of fire in every direction.
I could imagine myself traveling through a huge hollow diamond, the rays of which produced myriads of strange effects.
Towards six o'clock, this festival of light began clearly and visibly to fall, and soon almost stopped.
The sides of the gallery took on a crystallized tint, with a dark hue.
White mica began to mix more freely with feldspar and quartz.
They formed the true rock, the hardest stone, supporting the four stories of the earth's soil without being crushed.
We were walled by an immense prison of granite!
It was now eight o'clock, and still there was no sign of water.
The suffering I endured was horrible, My uncle now kept at the head of our little column.
Nothing could make him stop, I, meanwhile, had but one real thought.
My ear was sharply on the watch to catch the sound of a spring.
But no pleasant sound of falling water reached my listening ear.
But at last the time came when my limbs refused to carry me any longer.
I fought bravely against the terrible pains I felt, because I didn't want to make my uncle stop.
To him I knew this would be the last fatal blow.
Suddenly I felt a deadly faintness come over me.
My eyes could no longer see, and my knees shook.
I gave one despairing cry, and fell!
"Help, help, I'm dying!"
My uncle turned and slowly went back.
He looked at me with folded arms, and then let one sentence escape, in hollow tones, from his lips,
"All is over."
The last thing I saw was a face terribly twisted with pain and sorrow, and then my eyes closed.
When I opened them again, I saw my companions lying near me, still, wrapped in their huge traveling rugs.
Were they asleep or dead? For myself, sleep was out of the question.
My fainting fit over, I was awake as the lark.
I suffered too much for sleep to come to my eyelids, the more since I thought myself sick unto death, dying.
The last words spoken by my uncle seemed to be buzzing in my ears, all is over.
And it was likely that he was right.
In the state of weakness to which I was reduced, it was mad to think of ever seeing the light of day again.
Above were miles and miles of the earth's crust.
When I thought of it, I could imagine the whole weight resting on my shoulders.
I was crushed, destroyed, and I tried in vain to turn in my granite bed.
Hours and hours passed, a deep and terrible silence reigned around us, a silence of the tomb.
Nothing could be heard through these giant walls of granite, the very idea was staggering.
Presently, despite my apathy, despite the kind of deadly calm I was in, something stirred me.
It was a slight but strange noise.
While I was watching closely, I saw that the tunnel was growing dark.
Then looking through the dim light that remained, I thought I saw the Icelander leave, lamp in hand.
Why had he acted like that? Did Hans the guide mean to abandon us?
My uncle lay fast asleep, or dead.
I tried to cry out and wake him.
My voice, weak from my dry and fevered lips, found no echo in that fearful place.
My throat was dry, my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth.
The dark had by this time become intense, and at last even the faint sound of the guide's footsteps was lost in the blank distance.
My soul seemed full of anguish, and death looked welcome, if only it would come quickly.
"Hans is leaving us," I cried.
"Hans, Hans, if you're a man, come back."
These words were spoken to myself, they couldn't be heard aloud.
Still, after the first few moments of terror were over, I felt ashamed of my doubts about a man who had so far behaved so admirably.
Nothing in his acts or nature justified distrust.
Moreover, a moment's thought reassured me, his leaving couldn't be a flight.
Instead of going up the gallery, he was going deeper down into the gulf.
If he had had any bad plan, his way would have been upwards.
This reasoning calmed me a little and I began to hope.
The good, calm, and steady Hans would certainly not have risen from his sleep without some serious and grave reason.
Was he on a trip of discovery?
During the deep still silence of the night had he at last heard that soft murmur we were all so eager to hear?