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Would he come back at last to the Pacific, where his Nautilus could sail free and independently? Time would show. After having skirted the sands of Cartier, of Hibernia, Seringapatam, and Scott, last efforts of the solid against the liquid element, on the 14th of January we lost sight of land altogether.
"You come soon again, I pray you. And if you will tell Sir Scraper, and all those others, your friends, the shell schooner is here. Exhibition in a few hours ready, free to all. Explanation and instruction when desired by intelligent persons desiring of to know the habits under the sea. Schooner 'Nautilus, from the Bahamas, with remarkable collection of shells and marine curiosities.
Right after catching them, our seamen dropped them in buckets of water. Its fishing finished, the Nautilus drew nearer to the coast. In this locality a number of sea turtles were sleeping on the surface of the waves. It would have been difficult to capture these valuable reptiles, because they wake up at the slightest sound, and their solid carapaces are harpoon-proof.
Some of the most ancient Silurian animals, as the Nautilus, Lingula, &c., do not differ much from living species; and it cannot on my theory be supposed, that these old species were the progenitors of all the species of the orders to which they belong, for they do not present characters in any degree intermediate between them.
"No, Captain; but a danger still exists." "What is that, sir?" "It is that to-morrow, at about this hour, we must open the hatches to renew the air of the Nautilus. Now, if, at this moment, the Papuans should occupy the platform, I do not see how you could prevent them from entering." "Then, sir, you suppose that they will board us?" "I am certain of it." "Well, sir, let them come.
I stared at my companions. They were armed in the same fashion, and Ned Land was also brandishing an enormous harpoon he had stowed in the skiff before leaving the Nautilus. Then, following the captain's example, I let myself be crowned with my heavy copper sphere, and our air tanks immediately went into action.
Often we could chart our course only by guesswork, a less than satisfactory method in the midst of these winding passageways whose landmarks change continuously. At last on March 18, after twenty futile assaults, the Nautilus was decisively held in check. No longer was it an ice stream, patch, or field it was an endless, immovable barrier formed by ice mountains fused to each other.
But Captain Nemo gave no orders. Would he wait for nightfall and exit through his underwater passageway in secrecy? Perhaps. Be that as it may, by the next day the Nautilus had left its home port and was navigating well out from any shore, a few meters beneath the waves of the Atlantic. The Sargasso Sea THE NAUTILUS didn't change direction.
These three men had been hurled overboard by a collision which had taken place between the "Nautilus" and the United States frigate "Abraham Lincoln," which had chased her. Captain Nemo learned from this professor that the "Nautilus," taken now for a gigantic mammal of the whale species, now for a submarine vessel carrying a crew of pirates, was sought for in every sea.
I caught a glimpse of pieces of stone covered with millions of zoophytes and masses of sea weed. My feet often slipped upon this sticky carpet of sea weed, and without my iron-tipped stick I should have fallen more than once. In turning round, I could still see the whitish lantern of the Nautilus beginning to pale in the distance.
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