The Secret of the Earth

Again the dry land was beneath us, picturesque and greener than ever. Similar fruits and trees greeted us here as upon the other continent. Indeed the climatic conditions appeared so equable throughout the interior, with the exception of the desert and the country contiguous to it, that there seemed no reason why the same food supplies should not be raised throughout.

But we were rapidly approaching the southern gateway of this newly discovered Eden, and I looked forward with horror to the darkness and cold which were soon to envelope us. Beyond that, I had the most pleasurable anticipations of returning to our paradise after acquainting the outer world with the results of the voyage.

XXIII

It took more than a week of rapid traveling to cross this last continent, during which time we ate and slept alternately, one of us constantly remaining on watch above. Many cities were passed of a splendor exceeding anything known upon our side of the globe, and during the transit we witnessed what we could not doubt were different nationalities, if not different civilizations. These changes were, however, not easy to estimate, from the fact that all we saw was so strangely, so utterly foreign that differentiations which would be marked and strongly apparent to a denizen of the inner sphere, were only slightly in evidence to us. It was as if a native of darkest Africa should journey abroad through Europe; it is not likely that he would perceive much dissimilarity between German, French, English or Russian citizens.

We halted only at long intervals, and generally in thinly settled districts, to overhaul our machinery, or stretch our legs upon the ground. The amount of territory covered during that week was vast, the air ship being kept at her highest speed. We crossed rivers, great lakes, or inland seas. We saw sights well worth recording, and marvels which we longed to investigate, and would indeed have done so were it not for our utter inability to communicate with the people; and perhaps some day, even if we should not return, it will be worth to write a fuller description of all the wonders we encountered in that strange inner world; that world which, since the dawn of creation, has been so close at hand, and yet whose existence we have never suspected.

Far to the south we crossed a body of water so closely studded with mountain islets, that many were connected by bridges, and nowhere could there have been a thousand yards between them, and this for a distance of five hundred miles. And yet here were evidences of a past civilization, in the deserted old castles, and rock carvings which abounded among them. We hovered close above some of the largest of these relics, without eliciting a response from a human being. Manifestly they had been deserted for untold ages. The golden trumpet had vanished from these desolate halls, neither was there any sign of life within.

A change was coming over the air. There was a chill and the light was fading from the sky.

"We must prepare for cold weather ahead!" said Torrence.

And then we went down into the cabin and made everything as taut and snug as possible. The hatching to the upper deck was closed, and every crevice carefully chinked. Our portholes were fastened and screwed down. Our ventilators arranged, so that the outer air could only reach us through coils of heated pipe; and if the air ship did not fail us, it seemed impossible that we should suffer in our rapid flight across the frozen sea of the Antarctic regions.

Gradually our disk of heavenly light receded toward the north; and it was clear that we were rapidly approaching the south polar opening. At last it sank entirely out of sight, leaving us in a chill, rapidly closing twilight.

By the time our preparations were completed, it became necessary to start the heaters, put on warmer clothing, and confine ourselves to the cabin. We had bade a final adieu to the summer land, and the rigor of the south polar regions was ahead. Darkness was coming down upon us, as well as the cold, and occasional masses of floating ice were seen from time to time.

At last the stars became visible, the first we had seen in more than a month, and then there shot up into the sky a great pink light – the aurora australis– to remind us of the bright and happy land behind. At that minute I felt a yearning to return; for there was the world of dreams, of poetry, rest, beauty and contentment.

"Torrence," I said, shuddering at the thought of what lay ahead, "how long will it take us to cross this horrible sea of ice and darkness?"

"If we press her, we can do a thousand miles a day. You can figure for yourself. But this region of cold and starlight need not disturb you, for we can dash through it like a meteor. Indeed, were it not for the danger of unlooked for eminences, we might sleep until reaching the land of the sun. But that, of course, cannot be, as a constant lookout through the forward port will be necessary."

The vessel had been furnished with a powerful headlight, which cast a dazzling illumination among the mirror-like surfaces beneath; and as we sat staring into the trembling path, constantly stretching away before us, we felt indeed, as Torrence had suggested, like the parasites of an earth-bound meteor, traversing these regions of ice and darkness in a single night.

Our cabin lamp was lit, and we were stationed at the forward lookout Torrence glanced at the speed indicator.

"Seventy miles an hour!"

I was startled. A mishap at such an awful rate of transit would smash us into a thousand atoms, and the news of our discovery be lost to the earth. But my brother was calm and unconcerned; he had no misgiving while one or the other of us remained on watch.

"It beats the Erebus and the Terror," I answered nervously, peering into the marvelous vista ahead, and the rapidly extending pathway dancing and flickering in the wonderful headlight.

Fresh panoramas were constantly unrolled in the glimmering distance. There were scenes that were strange and alarming. Pinnacles and ridges of ice – autochthonous – awful – would compel us to rise to sudden and terrible heights, to clear them. It was like a steeple chase on a gigantic scale. We were leaping fences, and clearing ditches; only the fences were ice masses hundreds of feet in height, and the ditches horrible chasms whose depths could not be guessed. On and on we flew, through these regions of mystery, which the most daring explorer had never even approached, and without a flying machine it seemed likely he would never penetrate. We did not suffer from the cold, wrapped up in our cozy cabin, although our spirit thermometer, which was placed directly outside one of the windows, where we could see it, marked a temperature as low as – eighty degrees. It was an atmosphere of death, and fortunately we were hermetically sealed against it.

"I propose," said Torrence, "that our next voyage into the interior of our planet be made through the south polar opening at midsummer, about January, to enable us to see what kind of country we are passing through!"

"That is easy enough to see now," I answered; "ice mountains, ice oceans, ice continents, icebergs, ice valleys of death; surely no living creature could exist in such icy solitudes, in such unutterable cold!"

"But you must remember this ice belt is probably not nearly so wide during the summer months. There is doubtless a change."

"Remember the Palæocrystic Sea!" I suggested.

"True," he answered, "but remember it was narrow, and that we have never seen it in the winter."

"Of all our experiences," I observed reflectively, "the present situation strikes me as the most remarkable, skurrying through these frozen regions like a comet, and spying out the land by the light of a candle. It is surely not the method most in vogue among pioneers!"

"It has certainly not been done frequently before," he answered; "but now that we know the way, a trip to the interior by either of the poles may become a desirable pleasure excursion; in fact it may grow into a fashionable fad, who can tell, and the future may develop – !"

He stopped suddenly, and we both became transfixed with horror at the sight that confronted us.

Directly below, but standing on the very pinnacle of one of the ice hummocks, was a human being, revealed by our headlight. The man was facing us, and waving his arms furiously. Could anything be more blood-curdling than such a sight in such a place? No ship or sled, nor indication of life was visible, save this solitary, deserted creature. The region was impenetrable to human beings; we knew it; it seemed incredible, and yet there it was, a living man, and alone, in this untraversed, and untraversable wilderness of ice.

Such solitude, such isolation, such an impossible fact, was like a sudden vision of the supernatural.

We had been moving at tremendous speed, but before we had quite passed this weird object Torrence had slowed down the air ship and a minute later had brought it to a halt.

We quickly wrapped ourselves in the heaviest eiderdown and fur garments we possessed, not daring to open a window for communication until thoroughly protected, as, of course, we intended taking the poor creature aboard, and to save his life, were it possible to do so. When every precaution had been taken, we backed the vessel, and lowered ourselves to a level with the ice. When the headlight had been brought to shine against the ice mass, a great white bear lowered himself down the side and leisurely walked away. He had been alarmed, and his curiosity aroused at the sight of our light, hence the mistake! We had a roaring laugh over the absurdity of our error, and then proceeded upon our journey at the former rate of speed.

We passed three ranges of lofty mountains, which looked as if they must forever bar the entrance to these regions of cold and darkness; for they were flanked with terrible glaciers and precipices, thousands of feet high, and sheathed in great ridges of glittering ice.

We rose to fearful altitudes in crossing the summits of these sublime and awful crags, and wondered if there was no gap or opening at sea level between them. Doubtless there must have been, but our shortest course lay directly over their highest elevations, not being inclined to take the time to explore their topography. By the light of day the view from these heights must have been grand beyond description, but at the time of year in which we crossed there was little to be seen. It is worthy of record that at an altitude of eleven thousand two hundred and eighty feet we encountered a temperature of ninety-one degrees below zero Fahrenheit. I cannot conceive that there is a colder spot on earth.

Dawn at last gladdened our eyes, and then the glorious sun became visible, though not until we had passed far beyond these unknown regions of Antarctic ice, but then our own world was about us, and we watched the growing day with intense interest. As we sped northward over the great Pacific, the air grew warmer, and life again became possible on deck.

Opening the hatchway we went above, and aired ourselves in the pure breeze of heaven, which blew gently across our bow, and was warm and grateful.

Then on we flew for days at a more moderate rate, following a direct line north over the South Pacific. We intended to make port in San Francisco, and then cross the continent in easy stages to New York. But man proposes and God disposes.

One afternoon, while smoking our cigars on deck, and enjoying the balmy air of the tropics, Torrence was surprised in looking over the rail to discover that we were much nearer the water than he had supposed. Going down immediately to the lower controlling board, he examined the apparatus and readjusted his screws and buttons, and tested the lever, but the vessel did not respond as she ought to have done. We were gradually sinking toward the surface of the water, and nothing we could do would check the descent.

"I can't understand it," said Torrence in dismay, "unless the vibrators have become deranged again, through exposure to the intense cold, and the ensuing heat. Contraction and expansion must be the cause. It is impossible to remedy it while in the air. We must seek some island immediately. Even then I am afraid, before we shall be able to proceed, that it will be necessary to duplicate some of her parts, which may require the aid of a machine shop. But for the present we must look out for our lives!"

We took an examination of the sun, and investigated our charts. We were south of the tropic of Capricorn, and far removed from those island groups that lay to the north and west of us. Indeed we were in a very ticklish place, for to the best of our knowledge there was no land anywhere in our vicinity. After so long and marvelous a voyage, after having encountered such perils of air, water, fire, ice, and land, it did seem doubly hard to perish in our own world, before even the news of our discovery could be given to that world.

There were two things which it seemed important to do without delay; the first was to throw overboard the rest of our gold quartz, and every weighty object; the second was to seal up this record as quickly as possible in some water-tight vessel, in the hope that it might be picked up, and the result of our remarkable journey become known. I rushed down into the galley to find a suitable cask for the purpose, but before I had secured what I wanted, I heard Torrence calling me above. He had discovered a blue line on the horizon which he believed was land. A careful examination convinced me that he was right, and our efforts were immediately directed to reaching it, and to saving our treasure as well. Having a direct goal in sight we now put on all speed, and flew over the water at the rate of seventy miles an hour, a thing we should have hardly dared to do except under the circumstances, but our lives, our news, and our cargo were at stake.

Lower and lower we sank toward the waves, but nearer and nearer came the island. Would we reach it in time? It was a wild, frantic race between distance and elevation. The air ship was screwed down to her utmost capacity in speed, but she was also falling at a rate which made the outcome doubtful. Having come so far with our treasure we naturally felt averse to parting with it. Enough gold quartz to have had any material effect upon the buoyancy of the vessel would probably have been worth more than a million dollars, and with salvation so near ahead, we were inclined to make every effort to save it all. Our jewels were inestimable, and no serious burden, and would, of course, either be saved entirely, or go to the bottom with us.

On we flew, now skimming so close against the waves that we could hear the spray as it dashed against the bottom, but we were rushing upon the island with terrific speed. We could see now that it was well clothed with foliage, and that a clean, flat beach lay before us, where we could land without difficulty, if we could only reach it. On and on we swept, but each dash of the waves was more ominous. At last a great white swell raised us bodily; would we sink with it? No, we were still a few feet above the sea, but the water had retarded our progress, and the vessel trembled violently in recovering herself. On again; but now every wave was slamming against our bottom, and throwing us up and down with a violence that seemed as if it must destroy us, if continued for more than a minute. Slam, bang, crash, as we bounded from wave to wave, and steadily settling between them, and yet how far away the island looked. We were clinging to the rail for dear life, not daring to go below for fear of being drowned, and holding on above lest we be knocked overboard. Suddenly Torrence left me, and rushed down the ladder at the risk of his life.

"Let's pour a barrel of oil over the water!" he shouted.

I was with him in a minute, and together we emptied the remains of our oil cask over the water. The effect was instantaneous. The waves subsided at once, and we found ourselves floating a few feet above the surface. It now seemed possible to reach the shore. Another minute decided the question, as we checked speed suddenly, and then dropped gently upon the beach. We had conquered, but where had we landed at last?

Examining our charts, with which we were amply provided, we discovered that the island to which we had escaped was not mentioned among them. It does not belong to any of the archipelagoes in this part of the world, and is situated hundreds of miles from its nearest neighbor, in a region clear out of the track of vessels, being in long. 113.40 west – lat. 26.30 south. It is uninhabited, and surrounded by a reef of rocks, and exceedingly dangerous to approach by vessels.

We made a thorough examination of the machinery, and our fears were confirmed. While the air ship is intact in every part save one, that one is just beyond our power to repair. In a mechanical laboratory this article could be replaced in a couple of hours, but here, alas, we have not the necessary conditions.

"It is a trifle," said Torrence, "and I should have brought a duplicate, but it is a trifle which has quite undone us!"

His words were ominous; more so than I appreciated at first, but as time continues to pass without bringing relief, their real significance is forced upon me.

We have been here now for more than a year, having landed upon the 8th of August, 1894, while it is now the 20th of September, 1895. Fortunately our island is well supplied with fruits and fish, or we should be in even sadder plight than we are. It seems incredible that we should have traversed so great a portion of the earth's surface, and skimmed her interior from pole to pole, to find ourselves at last stranded upon this lonely shore, where the sight of a sail has never relieved the monotony of our solitude. It does indeed look as though Providence guarded the knowledge of our wonderful secret from the world at large, else why should we not have been permitted to carry it a little further.