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Updated: May 17, 2025
One resource still left was to speak English. Perhaps they would be familiar with this nearly universal language. But I only knew it, as I did the German language, well enough to read it fluently, not well enough to speak it correctly. Here, however, our overriding need was to make ourselves understood. "Come on, it's your turn," I told the harpooner. "Over to you, Mr. Land.
Quickly the panel through which we went was shut and bolted by means of a wrench which Ned Land had secured. The opening of the boat was also quickly fastened after we had got inside, and the harpooner had begun to undo from the inside the screws that still fastened the boat to the Nautilus. Suddenly a great noise was heard within the submarine.
"Well, then, at least he dies the death of a hero," was the reply "tempesting the brine, and perhaps even sinking the harpooner."
"What do you know about this, Tom?" demanded the young second mate. "That critter's gone to sleep down there, hasn't it?" "It'll be drowned!" exclaimed the old harpooner. "That's what'll happen to it." "Drowned!" cackled one of the crew. "What you givin' us, old hardshell? Drown a whale, eh? That's like the boy that pumped water on the frog to drown him." "You wait and see," growled old Tom.
But I was saved the crime of murder, for he was so ravenous when he came down, that he ate nearly the whole of a man's leg, and died from repletion during the night. I cannot express to your highness the satisfaction that I felt at finding that the carcase of the harpooner was in my possession. I surveyed my treasure over and over again with delight. I could now cook my French dishes.
"But, my worthy Ned, the forests of the Island of Crespo are nothing but submarine forests." "Good!" said the disappointed harpooner, who saw his dreams of fresh meat fade away. "And you, M. Aronnax, are you going to dress yourself in those clothes?" "There is no alternative, Master Ned."
The harpooner who leaped overboard escaped death by the act, the tail having struck the very spot on which he stood. The effects of the blow were astonishing the keel was broken, the gunwales and every plank excepting two were cut through, and it was evident that the boat would have been completely divided, had not the tail struck directly upon a coil of lines. The boat was rendered useless.
When at last we did get into their water, and the mate's harpooner stood up to dart, his foot slipped, and down he came with a clatter enough to scare a cachalot twenty miles away. It gallied our friends effectually, sending them flying in different directions at the top of their speed.
Here a whale being heard blowing, a harpoon, with a line fastened to it, was conveyed across the ice, from a boat on guard, and the harpooner succeeded in striking the whale, at the distance of three hundred and fifty yards from the verge. After some time it made its appearance on the exterior, and was again struck, at the moment it was about to go under the second time.
I do not give him as a specimen of the masters of all whalers, for I fear there are few like him, though they must of necessity be intelligent and superior men. There were three mates. The chief mate, Mr Todd, was also chief harpooner or specksioneer. Then there were the other harpooners, boat-steerers, line-managers, and coopers, beside foremast-men, landsmen, and apprentices.
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