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Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea
Chapter 4. NED LAND
Captain Farragut was a good seaman, worthy of the frigate he commanded.
His ship and he were one, he was its soul.
On the question of the sea creature, there was no doubt in his mind.
And he wouldn't allow anyone on board to argue about the animal's existence.
He believed in it, as certain good women believe in the leviathan, by faith, not by reason.
The monster did exist, and he had sworn to rid the seas of it.
He was a kind of Knight of Rhodes, a second Dieudonne de Gozon, going to meet the serpent that destroyed the island.
Either Captain Farragut would kill the narwhal, or the narwhal would kill the captain, there was no third choice.
The officers on board shared their chief's opinion.
They were always chatting, discussing, and calculating the different chances of a meeting, watching the vast surface of the ocean closely.
More than one man voluntarily took a place in the cross-trees, who would have cursed such a spot under any other conditions.
As long as the sun made its daily journey, the rigging was full of sailors whose feet were burnt by the deck's heat.
Still, the Abraham Lincoln hadn't yet reached the suspected waters of the Pacific.
As for the ship's crew, they wanted nothing more than to meet the unicorn, harpoon it, lift it on board, and finish it.
They watched the sea with eager attention.
Besides, Captain Farragut had spoken of two thousand dollars set aside for whoever first saw the monster.
The prize would go whether the witness was a cabin boy, a common sailor, or an officer.
I leave you to imagine how eyes were used on board the Abraham Lincoln.
For my own part, I wasn't behind the others, and I didn't leave my share of daily observations to anyone.
The frigate could have been called the Argus, for a hundred reasons.
Only one among us, Conseil, seemed to protest by his indifference against the question that interested us all so much.
And he seemed out of place with the general enthusiasm on board.
I have said that Captain Farragut had carefully provided his ship with every tool for catching the giant sea creature.
No whaler had ever been better armed.
We had every known weapon, from the harpoon thrown by hand to the barbed arrows of the blunderbuss and the explosive balls of the duck-gun.
On the forecastle lay the perfect breech-loading gun, thick at the breech and narrow in the bore, modelled on the Exhibition of 1867.
This precious weapon of American origin could easily throw a conical projectile of nine pounds to an average distance of ten miles.
So the Abraham Lincoln didn't lack any means of destruction.
And what was even better, she had on board Ned Land, the prince of harpooners.
Ned Land was a Canadian, with an unusual quickness of hand, and he had no equal in his dangerous job.
He had skill, coolness, boldness, and cleverness in a high degree, and it must be a clever whale or a very "cute"
Cachalot to escape the strike of his harpoon.
Ned Land was about forty years old.
He was a tall man, more than six feet high, strongly built, serious and quiet, occasionally violent, and very passionate when someone disagreed with him.
His appearance attracted attention, but above all the boldness of his look, which gave a strange expression to his face.
Who calls himself Canadian calls himself French.
And though Ned Land wasn't very talkative, I must admit that he took a certain liking for me.
My nationality drew him to me, no doubt.
It was a chance for him to talk, and for me to hear, that old language of Rabelais, which is still used in some Canadian provinces.
The harpooner's family was originally from Quebec, and was already a tribe of tough fishermen when this town belonged to France.
Little by little, Ned Land got a taste for chatting.
And I loved to hear the story of his adventures in the polar seas.
He told about his fishing and his fights with natural poetic expression.
His story took the form of an epic poem.
And I seemed to be listening to a Canadian Homer singing the Iliad of the northern regions.
I'm describing this tough companion as I really knew him.
We're old friends now, united in that unchangeable friendship that's born and strengthened in extreme dangers, Ah, brave Ned!
I ask for nothing more than to live a hundred years longer, so that I may have more time to dwell longer on your memory.
Now, what was Ned Land's opinion on the question of the sea monster?
I must admit that he didn't believe in the unicorn.
And he was the only one on board who didn't share that universal belief.
He even avoided the subject, which I one day thought it was my duty to push him on.
One evening, 30 July, three weeks after our departure, the frigate was off Cape Blanc, thirty miles downwind of Patagonia.
We had crossed the Tropic of Capricorn, and the Straits of Magellan opened less than seven hundred miles to the south.
Before eight days were over, the Abraham Lincoln would be sailing the waters of the Pacific.
Seated on the poop, Ned Land smoked his pipe and watched the sea.
I was chatting with him as we watched the mysterious sea, whose great depths until then had been unreachable by the human eye.
I naturally led the conversation to the giant unicorn, and I examined the different chances of success or failure of the expedition.
But seeing that Ned Land let me speak without saying much himself, I pressed him more closely.
Well, Ned, I said, is it possible you aren't convinced the sea creature we're following exists?
Do you have any specific reason to be so doubtful?
Do you have any specific reason to be so doubtful?
The harpooner looked at me steadily for a few moments before answering.
He struck his broad forehead with his hand, a habit of his, as if to collect himself, and said at last, "Perhaps I do, M. Aronnax."
"But, Ned, you're a whaler by profession."
"You're familiar with all the great sea mammals."
"Your imagination might easily accept the idea of enormous sea creatures."
"You should be the last to doubt under such circumstances!"
"That's exactly what tricks you, Professor," Ned replied.
"That ordinary people should believe in strange comets traveling through space, and in the existence of ancient monsters in the heart of the globe, that may be."
"But neither an astronomer nor a geologist believes in such fantasies."
"As a whaler, I've followed many a sea creature, harpooned a great number, and killed several."
"But however strong or well-armed they may have been, neither their tails nor their weapons could have even scratched the iron plates of a steamer."
"But, Ned, they tell of ships that the teeth of the narwhal have pierced right through."
"Wooden ships, that's possible," the Canadian replied.
"But I've never seen it done. And until further proof, I deny that whales, sea creatures, or sea-unicorns could ever produce the effect you describe."
"Well, Ned, I repeat it with a belief based on the logic of facts".
I believe in the existence of a mammal with a powerful body.
It belongs to the branch of vertebrates, like whales, cachalots, or dolphins.
It's equipped with a defensive horn of great penetrating power.
"Hmm!" said the harpooner, shaking his head with the air of a man who wouldn't be convinced.
"Notice one thing, my worthy Canadian," I continued.
If such an animal exists, it must live in the depths of the ocean.
It visits layers miles below the water's surface.
Its body must have strength beyond all comparison.
"And why this powerful body?" demanded Ned.
"Because it needs incredible strength to stay in those layers and resist their pressure."
"Listen to me."
"Let's admit that the pressure of the atmosphere is shown by the weight of a column of water thirty-two feet high."
"In reality, the column of water would be shorter, since we're talking about sea water, whose density is greater than that of fresh water."
"When you dive, Ned, the pressure on your body increases."
"For every thirty-two feet of water above you, you bear one atmosphere of pressure."
"That equals 15 pounds per square inch of your body's surface."
It follows, then, that at 320 feet this pressure equals 10 atmospheres, at 3,200 feet 100 atmospheres, and at 32,000 feet 1,000 atmospheres, about 6 miles.
In other words, at that depth each three-eighthsinch square of your body's surface would bear 5,600 pounds of pressure.
"Ah, my brave Ned, do you know how many square inches you carry on the surface of your body?"
"I have no idea, M. Aronnax."
"About 6,500. And since in reality the atmospheric pressure is about 15 pounds to the square inch, your 6,500 square inches bear at this moment a pressure of 97,500 pounds."
"Without me feeling it?"
"Without you feeling it."
"And if you aren't crushed by such a pressure, it's because the air enters the inside of your body with equal pressure."
"So there's a perfect balance between the inside and outside pressure, which cancel each other out, and that allows you to bear it without discomfort."
"But in the water, it's another thing."
"Yes, I understand," Ned replied, becoming more attentive.
"Because the water surrounds me, but doesn't enter."
"Exactly, Ned."
"At 32 feet beneath the surface of the sea you'd undergo a pressure of 97,500 pounds, and at 320 feet it's ten times that pressure."
"At 3,200 feet it's a hundred times, and at 32,000 feet it's a thousand times, or 97,500,000 pounds, which would flatten you like a hydraulic press"!
"The devil!" exclaimed Ned.
"Very well, my worthy harpooner."
"If some vertebrate, several hundred yards long and large in proportion, can stay in such depths, we must estimate the pressure they undergo."
"The surface of these creatures is shown by millions of square inches, which equals tens of millions of pounds."
"Consider, then, what must be the strength of their bone structure, and the power of their body to withstand such pressure!"
"Why!" exclaimed Ned Land.
"They must be made of iron plates eight inches thick, like the armoured frigates."
"As you say, Ned."
"And think what destruction such a mass would cause, if thrown with the speed of an express train against the hull of a ship."
"Yes, certainly, perhaps," the Canadian replied, shaken by these numbers but not yet willing to give in.
"Well, have I convinced you?"
"You've convinced me of one thing, sir, which is that if such animals do exist at the bottom of the seas, they must necessarily be as strong as you say."
"But if they don't exist, my stubborn harpooner, how do you explain the accident to the Scotia?"