CHAPTER XVI.
BOLDLY DOWN THE CRATER
Supper was rapidly devoured, and the little company housed themselvesas best they could. The bed was hard, the shelter not verysubstantial, and our position an anxious one, at five thousand feetabove the sea level. Yet I slept particularly well; it was one of thebest nights I had ever had, and I did not even dream.
Next morning we awoke half frozen by the sharp keen air, but with thelight of a splendid sun. I rose from my granite bed and went out toenjoy the magnificent spectacle that lay unrolled before me.
I stood on the very summit of the southernmost of Snaefell's peaks.The range of the eye extended over the whole island. By an opticallaw which obtains at all great heights, the shores seemed raised andthe centre depressed. It seemed as if one of Helbesmer's raised mapslay at my feet. I could see deep valleys intersecting each other inevery direction, precipices like low walls, lakes reduced to ponds,rivers abbreviated into streams. On my right were numberless glaciersand innumerable peaks, some plumed with feathery clouds of smoke. Theundulating surface of these endless mountains, crested with sheets ofsnow, reminded one of a stormy sea. If I looked westward, there theocean lay spread out in all its magnificence, like a merecontinuation of those flock-like summits. The eye could hardly tellwhere the snowy ridges ended and the foaming waves began.
I was thus steeped in the marvellous ecstasy which all high summitsdevelop in the mind; and now without giddiness, for I was beginningto be accustomed to these sublime aspects of nature. My dazzled eyeswere bathed in the bright flood of the solar rays. I was forgettingwhere and who I was, to live the life of elves and sylphs, thefanciful creation of Scandinavian superstitions. I felt intoxicatedwith the sublime pleasure of lofty elevations without thinking of theprofound abysses into which I was shortly to be plunged. But I wasbrought back to the realities of things by the arrival of Hans andthe Professor, who joined me on the summit.
My uncle pointed out to me in the far west a light steam or mist, asemblance 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 thewhite bears, borne by the ice fields from the north, are carried eveninto Iceland. But never mind that. Here we are at the top of Snaefelland here are two peaks, one north and one south. Hans will tell usthe 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 Snaefell resembled an inverted cone, the opening of whichmight be half a league in diameter. Its depth appeared to be abouttwo thousand feet. Imagine the aspect of such a reservoir, brim fulland running over with liquid fire amid the rolling thunder. Thebottom of the funnel was about 250 feet in circuit, so that thegentle slope allowed its lower brim to be reached without muchdifficulty. Involuntarily I compared the whole crater to an enormouserected mortar, and the comparison put me in a terrible fright.
"What madness," I thought, "to go down into a mortar, perhaps aloaded 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 coolnessresumed the lead, and I followed him without a word.
In order to facilitate the descent, Hans wound his way down the coneby 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 andwell-defined sharpness.
In certain parts of the cone there were glaciers. Here Hans advancedonly with extreme precaution, sounding his way with his iron-pointedpole, to discover any crevasses in it. At particularly dubiouspassages we were obliged to connect ourselves with each other by along cord, in order that any man who missed his footing might be heldup by his companions. This solid formation was prudent, but did notremove all danger.
Yet, notwithstanding the difficulties of the descent, down steepsunknown to the guide, the journey was accomplished without accidents,except the loss of a coil of rope, which escaped from the hands of anIcelander, 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 theupper aperture of the cone, framing a bit of sky of very smallcircumference, but almost perfectly round. Just upon the edgeappeared the snowy peak of Saris, standing out sharp and clearagainst endless space.
At the bottom of the crater were three chimneys, through which, inits eruptions, Snaefell had driven forth fire and lava from itscentral furnace. Each of these chimneys was a hundred feet indiameter. They gaped before us right in our path. I had not thecourage to look down either of them. But Professor Liedenbrock hadhastily surveyed all three; he was panting, running from one to theother, gesticulating, and uttering incoherent expressions. Hans andhis comrades, seated upon loose lava rocks, looked at him with as muchwonder as they knew how to express, and perhaps taking him for anescaped lunatic.
Suddenly my uncle uttered a cry. I thought his foot must have slippedand that he had fallen down one of the holes. But, no; I saw him,with arms outstretched and legs straddling wide apart, erect before agranite rock that stood in the centre of the crater, just like apedestal made ready to receive a statue of Pluto. He stood like a manstupefied, 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 thewestern face of the block, in Runic characters, half mouldered awaywith 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 astate 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 myuncle and Hans at the bottom of the crater. The Icelanders had beendismissed, and they were now descending the outer slopes of Snaefellto return to Stapi.
Hans slept peaceably at the foot of a rock, in a lava bed, where hehad found a suitable couch for himself; but my uncle was pacingaround the bottom of the crater like a wild beast in a cage. I hadneither the wish nor the strength to rise, and following the guide'sexample I went off into an unhappy slumber, fancying I could hearominous 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 thesummit of the cone. I did not know this first from the appearances ofnature, but I found it out by my uncle's impetuous wrath.
I soon found out the cause, and hope dawned again in my heart. Forthis 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 thatparticular way during the latter days of the month of June.
That sharp peak might hence be considered as the gnomon of a vast sundial, the shadow projected from which on a certain day would pointout the road to the centre of the earth.
Now, no sun no shadow, and therefore no guide. Here was June 25. Ifthe sun was clouded for six days we must postpone our visit till nextyear.
My limited powers of description would fail, were I to attempt apicture of the Professor's angry impatience. The day wore on, and noshadow came to lay itself along the bottom of the crater. Hans didnot move from the spot he had selected; yet he must be asking himselfwhat were we waiting for, if he asked himself anything at all. Myuncle spoke not a word to me. His gaze, ever directed upwards, waslost in the grey and misty space beyond.
r /> On the 26th nothing yet. Rain mingled with snow was falling all daylong. Hans built a hut of pieces of lava. I felt a malicious pleasurein watching the thousand rills and cascades that came tumbling downthe sides of the cone, and the deafening continuous din awaked byevery stone against which they bounded.
My uncle's rage knew no bounds. It was enough to irritate a meekerman than he; for it was foundering almost within the port.
But Heaven never sends unmixed grief, and for Professor Liedenbrockthere was a satisfaction in store proportioned to his desperateanxieties.
The next day the sky was again overcast; but on the 29th of June, thelast day but one of the month, with the change of the moon came achange of weather. The sun poured a flood of light down the crater.Every hillock, every rock and stone, every projecting surface, hadits share of the beaming torrent, and threw its shadow on the ground.Amongst them all, Scartaris laid down his sharp-pointed angularshadow which began to move slowly in the opposite direction to thatof the radiant orb.
My uncle turned too, and followed it.
At noon, being at its least extent, it came and softly fell upon theedge 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.
"_Foruet!_" was his tranquil answer.
"Forward!" replied my uncle.
It was thirteen minutes past one.