CHAPTER XXIII.THE ENGLISH FLAG.
One cry, bursting from the lips of the other four, succeeded theirfirst stupefaction.
"Hatteras!" cried the doctor.
"Gone!" said Johnson and Bell.
"Lost!"
They looked about, but nothing was to be seen on the storm-tossed sea.Duke barked despairingly; he tried to spring into the water, but Bellmanaged to hold him.
"Take a place at the helm, Altamont," said the doctor; "let us tryeverything to save the captain."
Johnson and Bell took their seats. Altamont took the helm, and thelaunch came into wind again. Johnson and Bell began to row vigorously;for an hour they remained at the scene of the accident. They soughtearnestly, but in vain. The unfortunate Hatteras was lost in thestorm! Lost, so near the Pole, so near the end, of which he had hadbut a glimpse!
The doctor called aloud, and fired the guns; Duke added his howling,but there was no answer. Then profound grief seized Clawbonny; hishead sank into his hands, and his companions saw that he was weeping.In fact, at this distance from land, with a scrap of wood to hold himup, Hatteras could not reach the shore alive; and if anything did comeashore, it would be his disfigured corpse. After hunting for an hour,they decided to turn to the north, and struggle against the lastfuries of the tempest.
At five o'clock in the morning of July 11th the wind went down; thesea grew quieter; the sky regained its polar clearness, and withinthree miles of them appeared the land. This continent was but anisland, or rather a volcano, peering up like a lighthouse at the NorthPole. The mountain, in full eruption, was hurling forth a mass ofburning stones and melting rocks. It seemed to be rising and fallingbeneath the successive blasts as if it were breathing; the thingswhich were cast out reached a great height in the air; amid the jetsof flame, torrents of lava were flowing down the side of the mountain;here creeping between steaming rocks, there falling in cascades amidthe purple vapor: and lower down a thousand streams united in onelarge river, which ran boiling into the sea.
"The mountain was in full eruption."]
The volcano seemed to have but a single crater, whence arose a columnof fire, lighted by transverse rays; one would have said that part ofthe magnificence of the phenomenon was due to electricity. Above theflames floated an immense cloud of smoke, red below, black above. Itrose with great majesty, and unrolled into huge layers.
The sky at a considerable height had an ashy hue; the darkness, whichwas so marked during the tempest, and of which the doctor could giveno satisfactory explanation, evidently came from the ashes, whichcompletely hid the sun. He remembered a similar fact that took placein 1812, at the Barbadoes, which at noon was plunged into totaldarkness by the mass of cinders thrown from the crater of Isle St.Vincent.
This enormous volcano, jutting up in mid-ocean, was about six thousandfeet high, very nearly the altitude of Hecla. A line from the summitto the base would form with the horizon an angle of about elevendegrees. It seemed to rise from the bosom of the waves as the launchapproached it. There was no trace of vegetation. There was no shore;it ran down steep to the sea.
"Shall we be able to land?" said the doctor.
"The wind is carrying us there," answered Altamont.
"But I can't see any beach on which we could set foot."
"So it seems from here," answered Johnson; "but we shall find someplace for our boat; that is all we need."
"Let us go on, then!" answered Clawbonny, sadly.
The doctor had no eyes for the strange continent which was risingbefore him. The land of the Pole was there, but not the man who haddiscovered it. Five hundred feet from the rocks the sea was boilingunder the action of subterraneous fires. The island was from eight toten miles in circumference, no more; and, according to theircalculation, it was very near the Pole, if indeed the axis of theworld did not pass exactly through it. As they drew near they noticeda little fiord large enough to shelter their boat; they sailed towardsit, filled with the fear of finding the captain's body cast ashore bythe tempest.
"They noticed a little fiord."]
Still, it seemed unlikely that any corpse should rest there; there wasno beach, and the sea beat against the steep rocks; thick ashes, onwhich no human foot had ever stepped, covered the ground beyond thereach of the waves. At last the launch slipped between the breakers,and there she was perfectly sheltered against the surf. Then Duke'slamentable howling redoubled; the poor animal called for the captainwith his sad wails among the rocks. His barking was vain; and thedoctor caressed him, without being able to calm him, when the faithfuldog, as if he wanted to replace his master, made a prodigious leap,and was the first to get ashore amid the dust and ashes which flewabout him.
"Duke! Duke!" said the doctor.
Duke did not hear him, but disappeared. The men then went ashore, andmade the launch fast. Altamont was preparing to climb up a large pileof rocks, when Duke's distant barking was heard; it expressed pain,not wrath.
"Listen!" said the doctor.
"Has he got on the track of some animal?" asked the boatswain.
"No," answered the doctor, quivering with emotion; "he's mourning,crying! Hatteras's body is there!"
At these words the four men started after Duke, in the midst ofblinding cinders; they reached the end of the fiord, a little placeten feet broad, where the waves were gently breaking. There Duke wasbarking near a body wrapped up in the English flag.
"Hatteras, Hatteras!" cried the doctor, rushing to the body of hisfriend.
But at once he uttered an explanation which it is impossible torender. This bleeding and apparently lifeless body had just givensigns of life.
"Alive, alive!" he cried.
"Yes," said a feeble voice, "living on the land of the Pole, where thetempest cast me up! Living on Queen Island!"
"Hurrah for England!" cried the five together.
"And for America!" added the doctor, holding out one hand to Hatterasand the other to Altamont. Duke, too, hurrahed in his own way, whichwas as good as any other.
At first these kind-hearted men were wholly given up to the pleasureof seeing their captain again; they felt the tears welling up intotheir eyes. The doctor examined Hatteras's condition. He was notseriously injured. The wind had carried him to the shore, where it washard to land; the bold sailor, often beaten back, at last succeeded inclambering upon a rock above the reach of the waves. Then he lostconsciousness, after wrapping himself up in his flag, and he only cameto himself under Duke's caresses and barking. After receiving a fewattentions, Hatteras was able to rise, and, leaning on the doctor'sarm, to go to the launch.
"The Pole, the North Pole!" he repeated as he walked along.
"You are happy!" the doctor said to him.
"Yes, happy! And you, my friend, don't you feel happy at being here?This land is the land of the Pole! This sea we have crossed is the seaof the Pole! This air we breathe is the air of the Pole! O, the NorthPole, the North Pole!"
As he spoke, Hatteras was the victim of a violent excitement, a sortof fever, and the doctor in vain tried to calm him. His eyes werestrangely bright, and his thoughts were boiling within him. Clawbonnyascribed this condition to the terrible perils he had gone through.Hatteras evidently needed rest, and they set about seeking a place tocamp. Altamont soon found a grotto in the rocks, which had fallen insuch a way as to form a cavern. Johnson and Bell brought provisionsthere, and let loose the dogs. Towards eleven o'clock everything wasprepared for a meal; the canvas of the tent served as a cloth; thebreakfast, consisting of pemmican, salt meat, tea and coffee, was setand soon devoured. But first, Hatteras demanded that an observationshould be made; he wanted to know its position exactly. The doctor andAltamont then took their instruments, and after taking an observationthey found the precise position of the grotto to be latitude 89degrees 59 minutes 15 seconds. The longitude at this height was of noimportance, for all the meridians run together within a few hundredfeet higher. So in reality the island was situated at the North Pole,and the ninetieth degree o
f latitude was only forty-five seconds fromthere, exactly three quarters of a mile, that is to say, towards thetop of the volcano. When Hatteras knew this result, he asked that itshould be stated in two documents, one to be placed in a cairn on theshore. So at once the doctor took his pen and wrote the followingdocument, one copy of which is now in the archives of the RoyalGeographical Society in London:--
"July 11, 1861, in north latitude 89 degrees 59 minutes 15 seconds,'Queen Island' was discovered at the North Pole by Captain Hatteras,commanding the brig _Forward_ of Liverpool, who has set his namehereto, with his companions. Whoever shall find this document isentreated to forward it to the Admiralty.
(Signed) JOHN HATTERAS, Captain of the _Forward_. DR. CLAWBONNY. ALTAMONT, Captain of the _Porpoise_. JOHNSON, Boatswain. BELL, Carpenter."
"And now, my friends, to table!" said the doctor, gayly.
"Altamont soon found a grotto in the rocks."]