Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Walter, Frederick Paul_ Poe, Edgar Allan_ Verne, Jules - The sphinx of the ice realm_ the first complete English translation_ with the full text of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym by Edgar Allan Po
Walter, Frederick Paul_ Poe, Edgar Allan_ Verne, Jules - The sphinx of the ice realm_ the first complete English translation_ with the full text of The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym by Edgar Allan Po
Jules Verne
The Sphinx Of
the Ice Realm
The First Complete English Translation
ee
excelsior editions
an imprint of state university of new york press
Published by
Stat e U n i v e r s i t y o f N e w Y o r k P r e s s
Albany
No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission. No
part of this book may be stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means including
electronic, electrostatic, magnetic tape, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise without the prior
permission in writing of the publisher.
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
For my wife
BARBARA BRYANT
Translating Verne
xvii
Appendix 1:
THE NARRATIVE OF ARTHUR GORDON PYM
261
Appendix 2:
Verne on Pym
377
Textual Notes
385
Recommended Reading
409
Foreword
I
n 1855 he was a nobody. He’d sold a short story, three novelettes, and the
scripts for a couple small-time comedies. Even so, that was the year Jules
Verne published Wintering in the Ice.
This sixteen-chapter novella appeared in the coffee-table monthly La
Musée des familles, moves at high speed, and establishes the template for much that followed
after Verne became somebody. The hook: a young sea captain goes missing off the coast
of Norway, and his father organizes an expedition to find him. Up north the rescuers
have to contend with snowbound living conditions, crew mutinies, marauding carnivores,
somersaulting icebergs, and other subarctic menaces. The tale’s climax is a holocaust of
cutlass duels and man-eating polar bears, but the son gets rescued and lives happily ever
after with his feisty fiancée—who, unusually for the time, goes along on the expedition
and has no trouble coping.
It isn’t surprising that the youthful Verne would lay a story in the polar regions. Back
then there was tremendous interest in the poles simply because nobody had visited either
place. In 1827 Britain’s William E. Perry had advanced as far north as latitude 82° 45’, a
record that stood for about half a century. But it wasn’t for lack of trying: as U.S. Rear
Admiral Thomas D. Davies wrote 160 years later (16), “by then the Americans had caught
the arctic fever,” and over the next decades Yankee explorers such as Elisha Kane, Isaac
Hayes, and Charles Hall vainly attempted to drive deeper into the arctic. As for the South
Pole, England’s Sir James Clark Ross got as close as latitude 78° 4’ in February of 1842,
another record that stood for half a century—and in this case there was a lack of trying.
In those days true-life polar adventures were mostly a seagoing activity, and young
Verne was automatically fascinated. After all, his birthplace was the French river town of
Nantes, just upstream of a major Atlantic seaport. During his boyhood, according to biog-
rapher Herbert R. Lottman (6–8), “he could see sailboats, clipper ships, and three-master
THE HUNT IS ON
In any case it seems that Poe’s specter soon gave a huge boost to Verne’s writing career.
In 1862, by no coincidence at all, the fledgling author finished an adventure novel about
ballooning. Pitching it to a major Paris publisher, P.-J. Hetzel, he wound up with both a
book contract and a lifelong business relationship. Poe’s role in this windfall? Earlier that
same year, according to French scholar Claude Aziza (vi-vii), “Hetzel had published sev-
eral of Poe’s short stories as translated by William Hughes. Wouldn’t this have given Jules
Verne—who already knew Baudelaire’s translations—the idea of approaching this editor
who had published an author close to his own heart?”*
Verne never forgot the mesmerizing American writer. In April 1864, not long after
linking up with Hetzel, he wrote a lengthy article entitled Edgar Allan Poe and his Works (1864)
for the above-mentioned magazine, La Musée des familles. The only piece of literary criticism
Verne ever published, it’s a bird’s-eye view of Poe for the general reader: a summary of his
tragic life plus plot rundowns and critiques of some of his short stories. Though he picks
occasional nits, his overall tone is admiring, full of both fascination and respect. What’s
My translation.
*
FPW
The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym is one of the all-time literary puzzles, maybe rivaled only
by Dickens’s unfinished crime story The Mystery of Edwin Drood (1870). Anyhow both works
have inspired carloads of analysis and conjecture, turning thousands of academics into
armchair detectives.
The circumstances of its writing weren’t typical for Poe, which may have contributed
to Pym’s quotient of mysteries. The impoverished Virginian had gotten married in his late
twenties, was casting around for a moneymaking literary niche, and had started writing
short stories. His luck didn’t change. According to a recent biographer (Hayes, 67), he got
a quick rejection from Harper & Brothers, a big-name publisher even in the early nineteenth
century: “A longer, book-length narrative was more marketable than a collection of short
stories. . . . Poe took Harpers’ suggestion as a challenge and began drafting The Narrative
of Arthur Gordon Pym.”
From fall 1836 to summer 1838, Pym proceeded by fits and starts. An earlier biogra-
pher (Silverman, 133) reports that Poe tried to market the yarn as a serial: “He published
two installments of Pym in the [Southern Literary] Messenger early in 1837.” Then the serial-
ization petered out, and according to Pym historian Ronald C. Harvey (106–7), the novel
went through three more stages of development: 1) additional adventures aboard the hapless
brig Grampus, to expand the story “into the long narrative Harpers had advised”; 2) the
novel’s second half, this time with adventures aboard the schooner Jane Guy and written late
in 1837, a period that saw a “resurgence of public interest” in U.S. antarctic exploration;
3) the final note and chapter 23 (featuring “hieroglyphic chasms,” in Verne’s catchphrase),
“a very late interpolation” in the summer of 1838.
Therefore, as Hayes sums it up (67), “Poe had done what the publishers told him
to do: he had written a sustained narrative long enough to fill an entire volume. Harp-
ers accepted the work.” Pym finally appeared in July of 1838, but its up-in-the-air finish
inspired plenty of head-scratching. Though it wasn’t a bestseller, it got extensive press, and
the novel’s inconclusive ending bothered critics from the get-go: one of its earliest U.S.
reviewers (Harvey, 36) instantly complained about the book’s breaking off mysteriously,
calling it “purely perplexing and vexatious.” Since then academics have advanced countless
solutions and interpretations, but even today they rarely agree.
It took two more decades for the novel to come to Verne’s attention: in 1858 poet
and Poe fan Charles Baudelaire published its first French translation under the title Aven-
tures d’Arthur Gordon Pym. It’s noteworthy that Wintering in the Ice had appeared three years
earlier—clearly Verne had gotten interested in polar exploration, manhunts, and quest plot-
lines before making Pym’s acquaintance. When the pupil is ready, the saying goes, the teacher
appears. Verne’s 1864 article on Poe suggests that he was immediately taken with Pym’s
baffling narrative: he spends a quarter of his essay on it, wondering if anybody will have
the chutzpah to complete the thing. At that juncture Verne took himself out of conten-
tion . . . but couldn’t take his nose out of the book. He quotes its close at the climax of
POLAR DEVELOPMENTS
For decades the Pym puzzle marinated in Verne’s mind. Meanwhile his career mushroomed,
likewise his interest in sailing. Over the years 1868–1886, he owned three different yachts,
traveling up and down the Atlantic coastline, tacking around the English Channel, even
going sightseeing in the Mediterranean. Describing one southbound junket in 1878, Verne
biographer William Butcher (246) records that the novelist took in “Lisbon, Cadiz, Seville,
and Tangiers, Morocco, including a boar hunt . . . the Strait of Gibralter, the Columns of
Hercules, Gibralter itself, Malaga, Tétouan (Morocco), and Oran.” This was aboard Verne’s
third and biggest yacht (Jules-Verne, 120–1), which was steam driven, measured ninety-two
feet from stem to stern, and required him to bankroll a ten-man crew.
Needless to say, sea stories poured from his pen: in addition to 20,000 Leagues, he
generated other should-be classics such as The Adventures of Captain Hatteras, A Captain at Fifteen
(1878), Mrs. Branican, and The Kip Brothers (1902). Finally, by the time the elderly Verne
faced up to Pym and wrote the sea story now in your hands, both poles were back in the
news. In 1895 famed Norwegian Fridtjof Nansen made huge strides in the arctic, setting
a new Farthest North of latitude 86° 14'. Down south the same year, another Norwegian,
Carsten Borchgrevink, finally beat Ross’s record: he and select crewmates became, according
to polar historian Roland Huntford (60), “the first men to set foot on South Victoria Land.”
In fact, while the 68-year-old Verne was grappling with Poe’s riddle, polar explora-
tion was coming down its home stretch. Over the period 1898–1900, the ubiquitous
Borchgrevink was among the first to winter in Antarctica; likewise the man often regarded
as the greatest polar explorer of them all, Norway’s Roald Amundsen, conqueror of both
the South Pole and the Northwest Passage. And further developments came thick and fast:
a Farthest South of latitude 82°17’ claimed by the UK’s Robert F. Scott in 1902, then
a Farthest North of 87° 06’ claimed by America’s Robert E. Peary in 1906. In another
three years Peary would claim the North Pole on April 6, 1909, and in two more years
Amundsen would claim the South Pole on December 15, 1911.
Warning to greenhorn discoverers: neither of these latter heroes got much joy from
his achievement. For years the UK shortchanged Amundsen (Huntford, 538): “English
schoolchildren were taught that Scott discovered the South Pole.” But at least the Brits stick
up for their own, whereas the American’s claim is still badmouthed by some U.S. historians.
Eighty years after the event, the Navigation Foundation (Davies, 5) analyzed Peary’s hard
evidence using computer-age technology—they verified that “his celestial sights, his diary,
his ocean soundings, and his photographs” consistently supported his claim. How did the
anti-Peary faction deal with this blow to their case? They simply ignored it.
Getting back to Verne, it was during this final chapter in geographic discovery that he
created his crowning combination of manhunt and polar quest. On Sept. 1, 1996, as his
grandson tells it (Jules-Verne, 193), Verne wrote his publisher about a Poe-inspired thriller
entitled The Sphinx of the Ice Realm:
In short, Jules Verne had come full circle. His youthful page-turner Wintering in the Ice
was his earliest sea story . . . then, forty years later, he gave us Sphinx, a sea story in wide-
screen technicolor. Wintering had been a tale of polar adventuring . . . Sphinx exploited all
the antarctic research it could, then vividly imagined the rest. Wintering was a tense search
for a lost mariner . . . Sphinx is Verne’s ultimate manhunt, literally two for the price of one.
And beyond this, Sphinx is the old Frenchman’s homage to a boyhood influence, a literary
role model, a long-distance mentor, a lifelong inspiration. His books rarely have dedications,
but he dedicated this one to Poe’s memory.
And maybe there’s a little humility in that—the reverence a wise man sometimes feels
for a forerunner. Even so, Verne is still cocky enough to think that he has gone Poe one
better, that he has written a novel (see above) “more true to life and I think more interest-
ing.” Unlike Poe he was a bestseller in his day and only humble up to a point.
This volume contains two gripping novels by two literary colossi. Both entailed research into
the geographic knowledge of their eras . . . both tried to be realistic and credible . . . and
both were published before the polar truth was out. But I won’t spoil their surprises and will
save further comment till the Afterword on page 401.
As for readers wondering about the smartest way to tackle this double-decker tome,
here’s what I recommend. If you’ve never read Pym, or it’s been a good while, I suggest
starting with Appendix 1 on page 261. My edition of Poe’s novel is reader-friendly, updating
punctuation and spelling for today’s purchasers, and his tale is compact enough for many
T
raduttore, traditore runs the old Italian adage: translators are traitors. And it’s
possible that no big-name author has suffered more betrayals than Frenchman
Jules Verne in his nineteenth-century English translations.
Fans and academics have been pointing out this problem for decades. It
was in the turbulent 1960s that NYU scholar Walter James Miller made a startling discov-
ery: Captain Nemo’s famed submarine, the Nautilus, was manufactured from a revolutionary
type of sheet iron that was lighter than water and could float.
Well, not really. Checking Verne’s French, Miller verified that the translator had sim-
ply made an idiotic mistake. And then other readers started finding other kinks: the first
English version of Journey to the Center of the Earth (1864) recomposed every third paragraph
and gave the characters silly new monikers—Verne’s Professor Lidenbrock became Profes-
sor Hardwigg. As for more literal translations, often they were preposterously abridged: in
Circling the Moon (1869) Verne includes an amusing chapter on using algebra to calculate
flight times—the original translator kept the chapter but left out the formulas. And then
there were issues of political correctness: in The Mysterious Island (1875) Verne condemns
the British Raj—his UK translator simply revamped him so that he voices support instead.
In short, the Victorian translations of many Verne novels not only abound in asinine
errors, they condense him, censor him, rewrite him, drop whole passages, fabricate new ones,
concoct different titles, rearrange chapters, redo characterizations, chop his descriptions,
dump his science, axe his jokes, and generally delete things that are politically iffy or call for
homework. As Verne specialist Arthur B. Evans has noted (80), “Scholars now unanimously
agree that the early English versions of Verne’s Voyages extraordinaires were extremely shoddy
and often bore little resemblance to their original French counterparts.”
How, then, has The Sphinx of the Ice Realm fared in our language? After all, it’s a toler-
ably well-known item, it regularly turns up in discussions of Poe’s The Narrative of Arthur
To my friends in America
Part One
1. Kerguelen’s Land 5
2. The Schooner Halbrane 12
3. Captain Len Guy 20
4. From Kerguelen’s Land to Prince Edward’s Island 29
5. Edgar Allan Poe’s Novel 39
6. “Like a Shroud Falling Open” 51
7. Tristan da Cunha 59
8. Heading for the Falklands 68
9. Getting the Halbrane in Shape 75
10. The Cruise Early On 84
11. From the South Sandwich Islands to the Antarctic Circle 92
12. Between the Antarctic Circle and the Ice Barrier 101
13. Alongside the Ice Barrier 110
14. A Voice in a Dream 118
15. Bennet’s Islet 124
16. Tsalal Island 131
Part Two
17. What About Pym? 139
18. Reaching a Decision 148
19. The Lost Islands 155
20. From December 29 to January 9 163
21. Tipping Point 170
22. Land? 178
23. Iceberg Somersault 186
24. The Finishing Stroke 194
25. Now What? 202
26. Hallucinations 208
27. Fogbound 215
28. Making Camp 222
29. Dirk Peters Goes to Sea 231
30. Eleven Years in a Few Pages 238
31. The Sphinx of the Ice Realm 245
32. Twelve out of Seventy! 256
PART ONE
1. Kerguelen’s Land
P
robably nobody’s going to put much stock in this yarn entitled The Sphinx of the
Ice Realm. Never mind, I still feel it’s worth airing in public. Readers are free to
take it or leave it.
It would be hard to imagine a more appropriate locale for the start of
these wonderful yet dreadful adventures than Desolation Isles—a name given them in 1779 by
Captain Cook. Believe me, after what I’d seen during the few weeks of my stay in these parts, I
can state that they deserve the dismal moniker coined by that famous English mariner. Desola-
tion Isles says it all.
This island group is located in latitude 49° 54' south and longitude 69° 6' east, and I’m
aware that in geography books these days it’s officially known as Kerguelen’s Land. Which is
only fair because in the year 1772, France’s Baron Kerguelen was the first to sight these islands
in the southern sector of the Indian Ocean. At the time of this voyage, in fact, the squadron’s
commander thought he’d discovered a new continent on the edge of the antarctic seas; but in
the course of a second expedition, he had to own up to his mistake. It was only an island group.
You can trust me when I claim that Desolation Isles is the only name that suits this collection
of 300 islands or islets plopped down in this lonely ocean vastness, which is troubled almost
continually by major storms from the south.
Even so, these islands are inhabited, and by the date of August 2, 1839, the number of
Europeans and Americans making up the central core of Kerguelen’s populace had increased
over the past two months—thanks to my presence in Christmas Harbor—by a total of one.
But to tell the truth, all I was waiting for was a chance to leave the place, since I’d finished the
geological and mineralogical research that had led me to make this trip.
This port of Christmas Harbor belongs to the most important island in the group,
whose surface area measures over 1,700 square miles—hence it’s half the size of Corsica.
It’s reasonably secure, open, and easy of access. Vessels can drop anchor in twenty-four feet
of water. After you’ve sailed around Cape François to the north—the hill of Table Mount
S
he was a vessel of 330 tons burden, masts leaning rearward and letting her run
close into the wind, quite agile under those conditions, her spread of canvas
including a fore trysail, spinnaker, topsail, and topgallant sail on the foremast, a
spanker sail and gaff topsail on the mainmast, a fore staysail, standing jib, and
fore-topmast staysail up front—there you have the boat Christmas Harbor was waiting for,
there you have the schooner Halbrane.
On board she had a captain, a mate or first officer, a bosun or crew foreman, a cook or
hash slinger, plus eight sailors, adding up to twelve men and ample for running her. Sturdily
built, timbers and planking secured by brass bolts, carrying plenty of canvas, her lines astern
adequately tapered, she was an easily handled and thoroughly seaworthy craft, well suited to
navigating between the 40th and 60th southern parallels, and a credit to the shipyards of
Birkenhead.1
I got these details from Mr. Atkins, who packaged them in the highest praise!
Captain Len Guy of Liverpool was three-fifths owner of the Halbrane, which he’d com-
manded for the past six years or so. He did business in the southern seas of Africa and Amer-
ica, going from island to island and from one continent to the other. If his schooner boasted
merely a twelve-man crew, it’s because she was strictly a trader. In order to hunt harbor seals,
sea lions, or other aquatic animals, she would have needed a more sizable crew, plus the har-
poons, tridents, lines, and related equipment called for by this rugged activity. I’ll add that in
the midst of these unsafe waterways (which were frequented back then by pirates) or near their
not-to-be-trusted islands, an act of aggression wouldn’t have caught the Halbrane off guard:
guaranteeing her safety were four swivel guns, an ample supply of shells and canister shot, a
hold appropriately full of gunpowder, shotguns, pistols, racks of rifles, and nets over the rails.
Beyond this, the men on watch never slept without one eye open. To navigate these seas without
taking such precautions would have been the height of recklessness.
I
didn’t sleep well. Several times I “dreamed that I was dreaming.”1 Now then—as
Edgar Allan Poe implies—whenever you suspect you’re dreaming, you wake up
almost immediately.
So I woke up, still very irked with Captain Len Guy. The idea of going off
on the Halbrane, when she left Kerguelen’s Land, had put down roots in my brain. Mr. Atkins
never stopped bragging to me about this ship, invariably the first to stand into Christmas Har-
bor every year. Counting off the days, counting off the hours, how often I’d envisioned myself
aboard that schooner, sailing away from these islands, heading west, making for the shores
of America! Our innkeeper never questioned that Captain Guy would cooperate and do the
businesslike thing. It was inconceivable that a merchantman would turn away a passenger not
requiring her to change course, a passenger willing to pay top dollar to come along. Who would
have believed such a thing?
Accordingly I felt a lot of anger smoldering inside me against that uncooperative charac-
ter. My bile was steaming, my nerves strung out. I was rearing up in front of an obstacle that
suddenly blocked my way.
I had an awful night, spent it in a fever of exasperation, and didn’t calm down till the
sun came up.
What’s more, I’d decided to have it out with Len Guy on the topic of his dismal behav-
ior. Maybe I wouldn’t accomplish anything, but at least I would get my feelings off my chest.
Mr. Atkins had talked to him, only to receive the answer you’ve heard. As for the oh-
so-helpful Hurliguerly, in such a hurry to offer his influence and assistance—what were the
chances he would keep his promise? I didn’t know and hadn’t run into him since. In any case he
couldn’t have had much better luck than the Green Cormorant’s proprietor.
I went out around eight o’clock in the morning. It was weather for dogs, as the French
say—or in our vernacular, a bitch of a day. Off to the west a downpour of rain and snow
doused the mountains at the far end, piling up clouds in the lower zones and creating an ava-
“But I could just as easily have said the arctic seas, or the North Pole instead of the South
Pole . . .”2
Captain Guy didn’t answer, and I thought I saw a tear glistening in his eyes. Then, switch-
ing to a different line of thought, anxious to cut short some smoldering memory my reply had
stirred up for him:
“Who,” he said, “would dare venture to the South Pole . . .”
“It’s a difficult place to get to . . . and there wouldn’t be much point in it,” I remarked.
“Still, you can find fellows adventurous enough to jump into that sort of undertaking.”
“Adventurous . . . yes!” Len Guy muttered.
I
t’s possible that no crossing ever got off to a more promising start. I’d had a
heaven-sent piece of luck: instead of Len Guy’s mystifying refusal stranding me
a few more weeks in Christmas Harbor, here was a lovely breeze taking me far
away from those islands—the wind was on our quarter, the waves were barely
rippling, and our speed was nine miles per hour.1
The Halbrane’s insides went hand in glove with her outsides. From her deckhouse to her
crew quarters, she was as perfectly organized and meticulously tidy as a Dutch merchantman.
On her port side in the front of the deckhouse stood Captain Guy’s cabin, inset with
a glass window that let him scan the deck and issue orders as needed to the men on watch
between the mainmast and foremast. The first officer’s cabin was identically situated on the
starboard side. Both featured a narrow cot, a cupboard of middling capacity, a straw-bottomed
chair, a table attached to the floor, a swinging lamp hung overhead, and various seafaring
instruments such as a barometer, a mercury thermometer, a sextant, and a nautical chronom-
eter ensconced in the sawdust packing of its oaken case, from which it emerged only when the
captain was ready to take his sights.
There were two other cabins located in the rear of the deckhouse, whose midsection func-
tioned as a wardroom that had a mess table between wooden benches with movable backrests.
One of these cabins had been fixed up for my use. It was lit by two windows, one facing
the corridor that cut through the deckhouse, the other facing the stern. At that location the
pilot stood in front of the steering wheel and beneath the spanker boom, which reached several
feet past the sternrail and helped the schooner sail close to the wind.
My cabin measured eight feet by five. I was at home with the realities of ocean travel and
didn’t need much more in the way of space—nor in the way of furnishings: I had a table, a
cupboard, a cane-backed chair, a washbasin on an iron stand, and a cot whose skimpy mattress
probably would have provoked some complaints from any passenger less cooperative than yours
truly. But I was looking at a comparatively brief crossing, since the Halbrane was taking me just
H
ere’s a quick analytical look at our American storyteller’s renowned work, which
was published in Richmond under this title: The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym.1
It’s essential that I give a summary of it in this chapter. You’ll see if there
are any grounds for doubting that the adventures of the novel’s protagonist are
imaginary. And besides, has a single one of this work’s many readers ever thought it was fac-
tual—other than Captain Len Guy?
Poe has his main character narrate the story. Right away, in the book’s preface, Pym
relates that after coming back from his voyage to the antarctic seas, he bumped into Poe, who
was one of several gentlemen in Virginia with an interest in geographical discoveries and editor
back then of Richmond’s Southern Literary Messenger. To hear Pym tell it, he gave Poe’s journal
permission to publish, “under the garb of fiction,” the first part of his adventures. When this
installment met with a favorable reception from the public, a volume describing the whole voy-
age came out under Edgar Allan Poe’s byline.
As Captain Guy revealed during our conversation, Pym was born in Nantucket, where he
attended the school in New Bedford till the age of sixteen.
He left that school for Mr. E. Ronald’s academy, where he became friends with a boy
two years older than he was, Augustus Barnard, the son of a sea captain. This young man had
already gone whaling with his father in the South Seas, and his stories about that ocean cruise
never ceased to fire Pym’s imagination.
Thus the closeness between these two young fellows gave rise to Arthur’s powerful long-
ing for adventurous voyages and to those inclinations that drew him most particularly to the
high latitudes of Antarctica.
Augustus’s and Arthur’s first escapade was an excursion aboard a little sloop, the Ariel, a
longboat that had a half deck and belonged to the latter’s family. One rather chilly evening in
the month of October, the two of them got very drunk, snuck out, boarded her, hoisted jib
and mainsail, kept full, and put to sea with a fresh southwesterly breeze.
*Hazelnuts. FPW
The boat approached the cataract with a headlong velocity for which Pym’s narrative
gives no reason. In places the fabric was torn, revealing a chaos within of flitting, indistinct
images that quivered in the powerful air currents . . .
In the midst of this fearful darkness, flocks of gigantic birds flew by, pallidly white,
shrieking their eternal Tekeli-li! And that was when the savage, in the extremity of his terror,
breathed his last.
And suddenly, caught up in an insane burst of speed, the canoe rushed into the embraces
of the cataract, where a chasm threw itself open to suck them in. But there arose before them
H
elped by the winds and currents, the Halbrane made uninterrupted progress. If
she kept this up, it would take two weeks to cover the distance—some 2,300
miles—between Prince Edward’s Island and Tristan da Cunha, and as the bosun
had predicted, we could stay on the same tack for the entire crossing. Sometimes
rising to a strong gale, the southeasterly breeze held steady, and all we had to do was take in
our upper sails.
In any case, Captain Guy left West in charge of working her, and that daredevil canvas
backer—sorry, I couldn’t resist—would only decide to take in a sail the instant a mast threat-
ened to come down. But I had no worries, and there were never any mishaps to fear with a
seaman like that. He had eyes in the back of his head.
“There isn’t another like him,” Hurliguerly told me one day. “Our first officer should be
commanding a flagship.”
“Definitely,” I replied. “West seems to be your ultimate seafaring man.”
“And don’t forget the Halbrane—what a schooner! Thank your lucky stars, Mr. Jeorling—
and thank me as well, since I talked Captain Len Guy into changing his mind about you.”
“If you were the one who made that happen, bosun, I appreciate it.”
“And you should, because he dithered hellaciously, our captain, despite all the appeals
from our cohort Atkins! But I made him listen to reason.”
“I won’t forget it, bosun—I still could be pining away in Kerguelen’s Land, but instead,
thanks to your interceding, I’ll soon be in sight of Tristan da Cunha.”
“In a few days, Mr. Jeorling. Look here, the word’s gotten out that they’re at work right
now in England and America on boats that have engines in their bellies and wheels that go like
a duck’s feet! Fine with me, and we’ll know what they’re worth once they’re on the job. To my
mind, though, those boats will never be able to compete with a fine 60-gun frigate sailing close
into a fresh breeze! Even if you have to lie at five points from the wind, Mr. Jeorling, it’ll do
the trick, and a seaman has no need for casters on his hull!”1
I guessed what was going on in the mind of this obsessed man. Torn from the southern
ice barrier, this slab of ice came from waterways where his thoughts were continually taking
him. He wanted to get a closer look . . . maybe pull alongside . . . maybe gather a few fragments
of it . . .
Meanwhile West ordered the bosun to slacken sail a little, and the schooner, now a point
off, headed for the ice slab. Soon we were less than a quarter of a mile from the thing, and I
could look it over.
As you’ve heard, the swelling in the middle was melting every which way. Trickles of water
were draining along its sides. The year was still young, and during the month of September
the sunlight was strong enough to make ice dissolve, to start the process and even speed it up.
F
our days later the Halbrane raised the unusual volcanic island of Tristan da Cunha,
the kettle of the African seas, you might say.1
No question, finding that ice slab over 1,200 miles from the Antarctic
Circle, followed by the appearance of Patterson’s corpse, was quite an amazing
event. And now here were the two brothers, captains of the Halbrane and the Jane, linked to each
other by the specter of Pym’s travels! Yes, it must sound incredible! But is it really, compared
to what I have yet to describe . . . ?
What’s more, the height of incredibleness, I feel, is that our American author’s novel
turned out to be actual fact. At first my mind rebelled . . . I wanted to shut my eyes to the
evidence!
Ultimately I had to give in and bury my last doubts in the ocean depths along with Pat-
terson’s body.
Plus, Captain Len Guy wasn’t the only one bound by ties of blood in this dramatic true
story, but—as I soon learned—our master sailmaker also had a blood relative in these events.2
That’s right, Martin Holt was the brother of one of the Grampus’s ablest seamen, one of those
men doomed to die before the Jane rescued Pym and Peters.
Hence, between the 83rd and 84th southern parallels, seven English seamen—now down
to six—had lived on Tsalal Island for eleven years: Captain William Guy, Patterson the mate,
and five of the Jane’s sailors, who had escaped—by Lord knows what miracle—from the natives
of Klock-klock!
And what would Captain Guy do at this point? Not hesitate for a second on the mat-
ter—he would do all he could to rescue the Jane’s survivors . . . he would take the Halbrane to
the meridian Pym specified . . . he would steer her to that Tsalal Island indicated in Patterson’s
diary. Jem West, his first officer, would sail anywhere he was ordered . . . his crew would obey
him without hesitation, and no fear of any travel hazards—even those beyond the limits of
human strength—could stop them. The captain’s soul would be with them, and the mate’s arms
would be guiding their arms . . .
T
he evening of September 8, I took my leave of His Excellency the Governor
General of the Tristan da Cunha Archipelago—the title that the gallant Glass,
formerly a corporal in the British artillery, officially gave himself. The Halbrane set
sail before daybreak the next day.
Needless to say, Len Guy let me stay on as his passenger all the way to the Falkland
Islands. It was a 2,000-mile crossing that would take only two weeks if we had the kind of
smooth navigating we’d just had between Kerguelen’s Land and Tristan da Cunha. Captain Guy
didn’t even seem surprised at my request: you would have sworn he was expecting it. But what
I’d been expecting myself was that he would get back to the matter of Pym and Poe’s book,
which he hadn’t been moved to bring up again ever since poor Patterson had proven him right
and not me.
However, though he’d left it alone so far, maybe he was saving himself to tackle it in due
course. Besides, the business couldn’t have any impact on his future plans, and he was deter-
mined to steer the Halbrane to those far-off waterways where the Jane had perished.
After we doubled Herald Point, the settlement’s few cottages vanished behind the
periphery of Falmouth Bay. With a fine easterly breeze just then, we headed southwest, every
sail bellying out.
That morning we consecutively left behind Sea Elephant Bay, those rocks named the
Hardies, West Point, Cotton Bay, and the promontory on Daly Beach. Even so, it took us
literally the whole day to lose sight of Tristan da Cunha’s volcano, whose snowy, 8,000-foot
summit finally faded into the shadows of evening.
During the course of that week, we navigated under optimum conditions, and if they
kept up, the month of September wouldn’t be over before we first raised the upper reaches of
the Falkland group. We needed to make a sharp turn to the south during this crossing, so the
schooner had to travel from the 38th parallel down to latitude 55°.
Now then, since Len Guy intended to plumb the antarctic depths, I think it’s useful,
even essential, to concisely review earlier attempts to reach the South Pole, or at least that huge
I
t forms a rectangle some 160 miles long east to west and 100 miles wide north
to south, and it takes in two big islands plus a hundred or so islets in longitude
60° 10' to 64° 36' west and latitude 51° to 52° 45' south—there you have the
group officially known as the Falkland Islands or the Malouines, which is 300
miles from the Strait of Magellan and serves as an outpost for the two huge oceans of the
Atlantic and the Pacific.
John Davis discovered this island group in 1592, the pirate Richard Hawkins visited it
in 1593, and John Strong christened it in 1689—all Englishmen.
Nearly a century later, the French were expelled from their settlements in Canada and
tried to colonize the aforesaid islands and operate a supply stop for ships in the Pacific. Now
then, since these folks were mostly privateers from Saint-Malo, they christened this island
group with the name Malouines, which it bore along with its title of the Falklands. Their coun-
tryman Bougainville set up the colony’s first court of justice in 1763, arraigning twenty-seven
individuals (five of them women), and ten months later the colonists numbered 150.
Their prosperity didn’t fail to draw criticism from Great Britain. The Admiralty dis-
patched the Tamar and the Dolphin under the command of John Byron. In 1766, after finishing
up a cruise in the Strait of Magellan, the English made for the Falklands, were content to cor-
ner an island to the west, founded Port Egmont, then continued their voyage in the direction
of the South Seas.
The French colony wasn’t destined for success—because, in addition, the Spanish had
staked a claim on the strength of an arrangement negotiated earlier by the pope. Accordingly,
after reaching agreement on matters of financial compensation, King Louis XV’s government
decided to recognize that claim, and Bougainville turned the Falkland Islands over to the King
of Spain’s representatives in 1767.
All this swapping, this “handing back and forth,” led to an inevitable result in the world
of colonial undertakings: the English drove out the Spanish. So, as of 1833, these amazing
confiscators are the lords of the Falklands.
I
t was the Falkland group that Captain Biscoe’s ships, the Tula and the Lively, set
out from on September 27, 1830, standing into the shores of the South Sand-
wich Islands and doubling their northern tip on January 1. It’s true, unfortu-
nately, that the Lively went down six weeks later off the Falklands—and we could
only hope this wasn’t the fate in store for our schooner.
So Captain Len Guy set out from the same spot as Biscoe, who took five weeks getting to
the Sandwich group. But that English mariner was positively thwarted by the pack ice beyond the
Antarctic Circle, and after only a few days he had to back out in a southeasterly direction as far
as longitude 45° east. It was due to this very circumstance that Biscoe discovered Enderby Land.
Captain Guy traced his course on the chart for West and me, adding:
We won’t be following in Biscoe’s footsteps, however, but those of Weddell, who voyaged
to the polar zones in 1822 with his ships, the Beaufroy and the Jane—the Jane, Mr. Jeorling, a
name with a destiny! But Weddell’s Jane1 had better luck than my brother’s and didn’t go to the
bottom behind the ice barrier.”*
*In 1838 it was likewise at the Falklands—in Soledad Bay, to be specific—that the Astrolabe under Captain Dumont
d’Urville agreed to meet up with her consort, the Zealous, just in case those two sloops of war got separated due to
foul weather or pack ice. In the course of some highly dangerous navigating over the years 1837, 1838, 1839, and
1840, this expedition ended up charting 120 miles of unknown shore between the 63rd and 64th southern parallels
and between the 58th and 62nd meridians west of Paris—lands that were named the Louis-Philippe Peninsula and
the Joinville Islands. In January 1840 the expedition visited the opposite end of the polar continent—if a continent
it truly is—and ultimately discovered the Adélie Coast in latitude 63° 3' south and longitude 132° 21' east, then
the Clarie Coast in latitude 64° 30' south and longitude 129° 54' east. But back at the time Mr. Jeorling left the
Falklands, he couldn’t have known of these highly significant geographic events.2 In addition there have been a few
other attempts since then to reach the Antarctic Ocean’s highest latitudes. Over and beyond Sir James Clark Ross,
we need to mention the young Norwegian seaman Carsten Borchgrevink who got to an even higher position than the
English mariner, also the 1893 voyage of the Norwegian whaler Jason under Captain C. A. Larsen, who found open
sea south of the Joinville Islands and Louis-Philippe Peninsula, then made it all the way past the 68th parallel. J.V.
T
he schooner cast off, headed southwest with continually favorable weather, and
six days later arrived in sight of the South Orkney Islands.
This group consists of two main islands: the bigger to the west, Corona-
tion Island, whose giant crown towers a good 2,500 feet in the air; to the east
Laurie Island, ending in Cape Dundas, which points toward the rising sun.1 Around it emerged
some lesser islands, Saddle Island, Powell Island, and a number of islets shaped like sugar
loaves. Finally the Inaccessible Isles lay to the west, plus Despair Rocks, no doubt christened by
some mariner who couldn’t pull alongside the one and gave up on reaching the other.
This island group was jointly discovered in 1821–22 by the American Palmer and
the Englishman Powell.2 Intersected by the 61st parallel, it lies between the 44th and 47th
meridians.
During her approach the Halbrane let us study the north coast with its convoluted masses
and steep bluffs, whose slopes—above all on Coronation Island—leveled off as they got down
to the seashore. Piled in a fearsome jumble at the foot of those banks were monstrous masses
of ice, which, in two months, would be drifting toward the ocean’s temperate zones.
By then it would be whaling season, time for fishermen to arrive and concentrate on
hunting cetaceans, while some of their shipmates would stay on the islands to chase seals and
sea elephants.
Oh, what a land of gloom and frost—and that’s such an apt description when the south-
ern summer’s first rays haven’t yet pierced its wintry shroud!
Not wanting to tackle the strait (which divvied these islands into two distinct batches
and was cluttered with reefs and ice floes), Captain Guy initially stood into the southeast end
of Laurie Island, where he spent the day of the 24th; then, after working his way around Cape
Dundas, he went down the south coast of Coronation Island and parked his schooner beside
it on the 25th. We searched the area for the Jane’s seamen but got nowhere.
In 1822—during the month of September even—Weddell came to these islands to hunt
hairy seals and found it a waste of time and energy, but that’s because the winter weather was
*Ospreys. FPW
*To estimate the purchasing power of these nineteenth-century dollars in today’s marketplace, multiply them by
twenty. FPW
O
nce the Halbrane had gone past that imaginary curving line drawn 23½ degrees
from the pole, she seemed to enter a new land, that land of desolation and
silence Edgar Allan Poe mentions, that magical prison of splendor and glory in
which the author of “Eleonora” hoped to be shut up for eternity, that immense,
indescribable ocean of light.1
In my opinion—to stick with less fanciful ways of looking at it—this land of Antarc-
tica, whose surface area exceeds 5,000,000 square miles, has remained the way our planet used
to be back in the ice age.
During the summer, as you know, Antarctica enjoys 24-hour daylight due to the rays the
sun casts above the horizon during its upward spiral. Then, as soon as it vanishes, the long night
begins—a night often lit up by glimmers from polar auroras.
So our schooner was going to cross these daunting lands during a time of continual day-
light. This 24-hour brightness would persist as far as the coordinates of Tsalal Island, where
we hadn’t any doubt we would find the Jane’s men.
During his first hours spent on the threshold of this new region, a person with a highly
imaginative mind would surely experience the weirdest overexcitement—visions, nightmares, a
sleepwalker’s hallucinations . . . as if he’d been transferred to the world of the uncanny. . . . On
the outskirts of these antarctic regions, he might wonder what was hidden behind that misty
veil trailing into the far-off distance. . . . Would he discover new data there in the three fields
of geology, botany, and zoology, new beings whose “humanness” was unusual, like those Pym
claimed he’d seen? What would he witness on this cosmic stage with its foggy curtain still
lowered over it? Under the intense oppression of his dreams, wouldn’t he start to despair while
thinking it over on his return journey? Wouldn’t he hear, via the stanzas of that strangest of
poems, the raven of its poet cawing to him:
“Nevermore . . . nevermore . . . nevermore!”
T
hough the waterways beyond the Antarctic Circle were extremely agitated, it’s
only fair to acknowledge that, so far, we’d been navigating under exceptional con-
ditions. And what a stroke of luck it would be if, during these first two weeks in
December, the Halbrane found Weddell’s route open . . .
Honestly, look at me—talking about Weddell’s route as if it were an overland road that
was nicely maintained, had mileage markers, and featured signposts reading South Pole This Way!
During the whole day of the 10th, our schooner had no difficulty maneuvering in the
midst of those isolated masses called ice floes and brash ice.* The wind direction didn’t require
her to do any tacking, it just let her proceed in a straight line through openings in the ice fields.
Though we were still a month away from the time polar ice generally cracks apart, Captain Guy
was used to these phenomena and stated that what normally happens in January—a wholesale
breakup—would take place this year in December.
Dodging these wandering masses didn’t give the crew any trouble. Genuine difficulties
wouldn’t arise till the day the schooner actually tried to clear a path through the ice barrier.
What’s more, we didn’t have any unpleasant surprises to fear. When ice was present, it
was indicated by those yellowish hues in the sky that whalers refer to as “ice blinks.” They’re
a phenomenon of reflected light that’s characteristic of these frozen regions, and they never
mislead the viewer.
Over the next five days, the Halbrane navigated without getting a scratch, without worry-
ing about collisions for even a second. True, the farther south she went, the more ice there was
and the narrower the passages were. A sight we took on the 14th gave us latitude 72° 37' with
the longitude pretty much as before, namely between the 42nd and 43rd meridians. This was
already a position beyond the Antarctic Circle that few mariners—neither Balleny nor Belling-
hausen—had managed to reach. We were just two degrees shy of James Weddell.
T
otally free of ice? No, it was too early to say this for certain. Off in the distance a
few icebergs were visible, plus drift and pack ice still floating eastward. Neverthe-
less the breakup on that side was in full swing, the sea was open wide, and ships
could navigate freely.
It was undoubtedly in these waterways, and up this wide sound (a sort of channel cutting
through the antarctic continent), that Weddell’s vessels had made it to latitude 74°, a position
the Jane was to go some 600 miles beyond.
“God has come to our assistance,” Captain Guy told me, “and may He see fit to take us
to our destination!”
“In a week,” I replied, “our schooner could be in sight of Tsalal Island.”
“Yes, Mr. Jeorling . . . so long as the easterly winds keep up. Now then, don’t forget that
in going along the ice barrier to its eastern end, the Halbrane veered off course, so we need to
bring her back west.”
“The breeze is in our favor, captain.”
“And we’ll make the most of it, because I plan on heading to Bennet’s Islet. That’s the
first place where my brother William went ashore. When we’ve sighted that island, we’ll be
certain we’re on the right path . . .”
“Who knows, captain—we might pick up some fresh clues there.”
“It’s possible, Mr. Jeorling. So today, after we’ve taken our sights and gotten our exact
bearings, we’ll make for Bennet’s Islet.”
Needless to say, it was time to check the most reliable guide available to us. I mean Edgar
Allan Poe’s book—in reality a factual narrative by Arthur Gordon Pym.
After rereading this narrative with all the care it deserves, I’ve come to a conclusion that
I’ll stand by from now on:
The core of it is true, meaning that the Jane had located and put into Tsalal Island—there
weren’t any doubts about this aspect of it, nor about the survival of those six shipwrecked men
A
fter covering about 800 miles from the Antarctic Circle, the Halbrane had worked
her way in sight of Bennet’s Islet! The sea was dead calm, so for the last couple
of hours the crew had towed the schooner with her dinghies, were worn out, and
desperately needed a rest. Accordingly we put off going ashore till the next day,
and I retired to my cabin.
This time no mutterings disturbed my sleep, and five hours later I was one of the first
out on deck.
Needless to say, West had taken every precautionary measure called for by a trip through
these dubious waterways. The strictest security reigned on board. The swivel guns were load-
ed, shells and cartridges piled up, rifles and pistols primed, boarding nets ready to hoist. We
remembered how the Jane had been attacked by the residents of Tsalal Island. By then our
schooner lay less than sixty miles from the scene of that disaster.
Night had gone by without any alarms being given. Daytime came and no boats showed
up in the Halbrane’s waters, no natives on the beach. The area seemed deserted, and anyhow
Captain William Guy hadn’t found a trace of humanity hereabouts. You couldn’t make out any
huts along the coastline, or any smoke behind it indicating that Bennet’s Islet was populated.
What I saw of the islet was—in line with Pym’s description—a rocky foundation
that measured about 2½ miles around and was so arid, you couldn’t find the tiniest hint of
vegetation.
A mile to the north, our schooner dropped a single anchor.
Len Guy pointed out that we’d gotten our bearings without any possibility of error.
“Mr. Jeorling,” he said to me, “do you see that promontory running northeast?”
“I see it, captain.”
“Isn’t it made up of piles of rocks that look like corded bales of cotton?”
“It is, just like the narrative says.”
JAN
L VERPO L
Jane, Liverpool . . . ! The schooner under Captain William Guy’s command! What differ-
ence did it make that time had rubbed out the other letters? Weren’t enough of them left to
give the ship’s name and her home port? Jane, Liverpool . . . !
Captain Len Guy took this plank in his hands and pressed it to his lips while a large tear
fell from his eyes . . .
It was a piece of rubble from the Jane, one of many scattered by her explosion—a piece
of rubble that had been carried to this shore, whether by countercurrents or on some slab of
ice!
I didn’t say a word and let Len Guy compose his feelings.
As for Hunt, I’d never seen such a fiery look break from his eyes—his hawk eyes flash-
ing—while he scanned the southern horizon.
Captain Guy stood up.
Hunt, still silent, put the plank on his shoulder, and we continued on our way.
When we’d finished circling the island, we halted at the far end of the bay, at the spot
where the two sailors were guarding our dinghy, and we were back aboard the schooner by
around 2:30 in the afternoon.
Len Guy wanted to stay at anchor till the next day, hoping a northerly or easterly wind
might just turn up. We kept our fingers crossed—can you imagine the Halbrane’s longboats
towing her all the way to Tsalal Island? Though the current would carry us toward it, especially
during rising tide, this thirty-five-mile crossing could take more than two days.2
Therefore we cast off again at daybreak. Now then, a mild breeze had come up around
three o’clock in the morning, so we could hope our schooner would reach her journey’s ulti-
mate destination without too much delay.
On December 23, leaving her anchorage off Bennet’s Islet by 6:30 that morning, the Hal-
brane headed south under full sail. One thing wasn’t in dispute—we’d collected new supporting
evidence of the catastrophe that had played out on Tsalal Island.
The breeze propelling us was extremely feeble, and all too often our deflated sails just
flapped against the masts. Luckily we tossed out a sounding line and found the current running
consistently southward. Given our fairly slow progress, however, Captain Guy wouldn’t raise the
coordinates of Tsalal Island before thirty-six hours had gone by.
The whole day I watched the ocean waves very closely and I thought they weren’t as deep
a blue as Pym said. Nor did we come across any of those thorny bushes with red berries that the
Jane hauled on board, nor the likes of that monstrosity of polar fauna: an animal three feet long
and six inches high, which had four short legs, feet with long claws a coral coloring, a silky white
body, a rat’s tail, a cat’s head, the floppy ears of a dog, and bright red teeth. Anyhow I’d always
viewed a number of these details as suspect and entirely due to an overdose of imagination.
T
he night went by without any alarms being given. No canoes left the island. No
natives showed up on its beach. The only conclusion to draw from this was that
the island’s occupants had to reside far inland. In fact, as we knew from Pym’s
narrative, it took two or three hours to walk to the main village on Tsalal Island.
So they hadn’t spotted the Halbrane’s arrival—which, in a nutshell, was all to the good.
We’d dropped anchor three miles offshore in sixty feet of water.
From six o’clock on we had a gentle morning breeze at our service, so the schooner raised
anchor, then went and found a new berth half a mile from a girdle of coral, which resembled
the circular coral formations in the Pacific Ocean. From that far out it was pretty easy to take
in the island’s entire expanse.
This was the appearance Tsalal Island presented: a circumference of nine to ten miles
(which Pym hadn’t mentioned), an ultra-steep coastline that was hard to approach, long arid
plains that were blackish in color and flanked by a series of moderately high hills. The coast was
clear, as I’ve said. We didn’t see any boats at sea or in the coves. No smoke rose over the rocks,
and it definitely seemed that there wasn’t a single person on this side of the island.
So what had been going on over the last eleven years? Could it be that Too-wit, the chief
of the islanders, was no longer alive . . . ? So be it, but what about the comparatively sizable
population . . . and William Guy . . . and the survivors of that English schooner?
When the Jane appeared in these waterways, it was the first time the Tsalal populace
had seen a ship. Accordingly, after boarding her, they viewed her as an enormous animal, her
masts as limbs, her sails as garments.1 These days they surely knew where they stood on this
issue. Now then, they hadn’t tried to pay us a visit—what accounted for this oddly restrained
behavior?
“Lower the big dinghy!” Len Guy ordered in an impatient voice.
Once this command was carried out, Captain Guy spoke to his first officer:
“Jem, have Holt take eight men down, plus Hunt at the tiller. You’ll stay at the anchorage
and keep a lookout both landward and seaward.”
Tiger—Arthur Pym
Tiger! He was the Newfoundland dog who saved his master’s life when the latter was hid-
ing in the Grampus’s hold . . . Tiger, who’d already shown signs of rabies . . . Tiger, who helped
when the crew mutinied by going for the throat of seaman Jones, allowing Peters to finish him
off almost immediately!
So the faithful animal hadn’t perished after the Grampus came to grief. They’d taken him
aboard the Jane at the same time as Pym and the half-breed . . . and yet the narrative didn’t men-
tion this, and even before the schooner found them, the dog wasn’t in the picture anymore . . .
A thousand contradictions crowded into my brain . . . I didn’t know how to reconcile
those events. But no doubt Tiger had been retrieved from the wrecked ship like Pym, then had
followed him to Tsalal Island, survived the landslide at the hill near Klock-klock, and finally met
his death in the catastrophe that had wiped out this segment of the Tsalal populace.4
But once again, William Guy and his five sailors couldn’t be among these skeletons scat-
tered over the ground, because they were alive when Patterson left them seven months ago, and
this catastrophe already dated back several years!
Three hours later we were aboard the Halbrane once more, after failing to make any other
discoveries.
Captain Len Guy retired to his cabin, shut himself in, and didn’t come out even at
dinnertime.
I felt it was best to not disturb his grieving and didn’t try to speak with him.
L
en Guy’s decision to leave his Tsalal anchorage and head north again at day-
break . . . this cruise ending so fruitlessly . . . our unwillingness to look for the
Jane’s castaways in another part of the Antarctic Ocean—all these things left my
mind in turmoil.1
Excuse me? The Halbrane would desert the six men Patterson’s diary said were still in
these waterways just months ago? Her crew weren’t going to do their duty to the end as human
decency demanded? When that earthquake made Tsalal Island unfit to live on, the Jane’s survi-
vors might have taken refuge on some other continent or island—and we weren’t going to do
everything we could to find it?
Yet it was only the end of December, the day after Christmas, almost the start of the
warm season. Two full months of summer would let us navigate all over this sector of Ant-
arctica. We would have time to get back across the polar circle before the dreaded cold sea-
son . . . and by that point the Halbrane would be ready to head north.
Yes, this clearly was the “pro” side of the issue. I’m forced to admit, however, that the
“con” side was backed by a series of perfectly valid arguments.
To begin with, up to now the Halbrane hadn’t been sailing at random. In following the
course Pym indicated, she’d been heading for a clearly defined destination—Tsalal Island. Poor
Patterson had stated that this island—whose coordinates were known—was where our captain
would pick up William Guy and the five sailors who’d escaped from the Klock-klock ambush.
Now then, they were no longer to be found on Tsalal Island—nor any of the local populace,
wiped out by some undetermined catastrophe on some unknown date. Had they managed to
get away before the aforementioned catastrophe, which took place after Patterson left, in other
words, seven to eight months ago?
In any case the issue boiled down to a very simple choice between two alternatives:
Either the Jane’s men had perished and the Halbrane needed to go home without delay, or
they’d survived and it was crucial to not give up the search.
D
irk Peters! Hunt was Dirk Peters, the half-breed . . . Pym’s devoted companion,
whom Captain Len Guy had wasted so much time looking for in the United
States, and whose presence might furnish us with a new reason for continuing
this cruise . . .
I’ve included enough clues in my yarn for readers to have spotted Hunt as Peters many
pages back, so it wouldn’t surprise me if they’d expected this plot twist, in fact I would be
amazed if they hadn’t.
In truth, making this connection couldn’t be more natural or logical: Captain Guy and I
had often reread Poe’s book, and its physical portrait of Peters is drawn with detailed strokes—
so why hadn’t we suspected that the half-breed and the sailor boarding in the Falklands were the
same man? Didn’t this go to show that the two of us weren’t outstandingly perceptive? Granted,
yet it’s understandable up to a point.
Yes, everything about Hunt indicated he was of Indian origin the same as Peters (who
belonged to the Upsarokas tribe out west), and maybe this should have put us on the right
track. But please remember the circumstances in which Hunt approached Len Guy, circum-
stances that didn’t give us any reason to question his identity. Hunt lived in the Falklands, a
long way from Illinois, in the midst of sailors of every nationality waiting to ship out on a
whaler during fishing season. . . . He’d been extremely unsociable with everybody since coming
on board. This was the first time we’d had a chance to hear him speak, and till now nothing—at
least in his manner—led us to think he wasn’t going by his real name. . . . And as we just saw, he
came out with the name Dirk Peters only when the captain finally put pressure on him.
True, Hunt was a pretty amazing fellow, a breed apart, somebody who caught your atten-
tion. Yes, now it all came back to me—his peculiar behavior after the schooner cut the Antarc-
tic Circle, after she started navigating the waters of this open sea . . . his looking continually at
the southern horizon . . . impulsively pointing that direction. . . . Then, too, it seemed like he’d
already been to Bennet’s Islet—where he collected rubble from the Jane’s shipwreck—and Tsalal
A
t the crack of dawn on Friday, December 27, the Halbrane put to sea and headed
southwest.
Work on board proceeded as usual, same discipline, same dependability.
At that point there weren’t any stresses or strains. The weather stayed fair, the
sea smooth. If these conditions kept up, the seeds of insubordination wouldn’t germinate—at
least I hoped not—and no problems would arise on that score. But lowlife types rarely use their
heads. Greedy, ignorant men have no time for obsessive imaginings. Stuck in the present, they
don’t bother with the future. Only the unvarnished truth—which brings them face to face with
reality—can knock some concern into them.
Would this truth ever come out?
As for Peters, now that we knew who he was, he didn’t have to change his little ways—
would he stay just as unsociable? I should point out that since he came clean, the crew didn’t
seem to bear him any ill will over those events aboard the Grampus—which were understand-
able, after all, given the circumstances. And furthermore, how could we forget that the half-
breed risked his life to rescue Holt? Even so, he went right on keeping to himself, ate in one
corner, slept in another, and gave the crew “a wide berth.” So did he have some other reason for
behaving this way, a reason that we didn’t know about, that might someday be revealed to us?1
Winds kept blowing from the northern quadrant (as they’d done while propelling the
Jane to Tsalal Island, then Pym’s canoe some degrees beyond it), and they were a big help to our
schooner’s progress. On a port tack, wind on our quarter, West could use every stitch of canvas
and run with this brisk, steady breeze. Our stempost cut swiftly through those clear, unclouded
waters, scooping out a white wake that trailed far behind us.
After yesterday’s dramatics Captain Guy grabbed a few hours of rest. And this rest must
have been troubled by whatever thoughts obsessed him—on the one hand, the hopes he had
for this new search, on the other, the responsibilities that went with such an expedition across
Antarctica!
In this locality, then, we’d found one of the group’s big islands, reduced these days to a
lopsided oval measuring 300 yards around and swelling 8 to 10 yards above sea level.
“Does the tide sometimes rise that high?” I asked Captain Guy.
“Never,” he answered me, “and maybe we’ll find some leftover plant life in the middle of
this island, or the remains of dwellings or campsites . . .”
“The best thing for us,” the bosun said, “is to stick with Peters, and he’s already leaving
us behind. That devil of a half-breed has the eyes of a lynx, and he can see things we’ll miss!”
In a few seconds we’d all made our way to the cape at the end of the islet.
Bones weren’t in short supply there—most likely the bones of those farm animals figur-
ing in Pym’s journal, various types of poultry, canvasback ducks, a species of common hog with
I
n the morning, Edgar Allan Poe’s book under my eyes, I carefully reread chapter
25 of Pym’s narrative.1 There it describes how, when the natives tried to catch
them, the two escapees and the savage Nu-Nu were already at sea five or six miles
from the bay. Out of that cluster of six or seven islands to the west that we’d just
looked over, only a few remnants were left in the form of islets.
What especially interested me in this chapter were the following lines, which I can’t resist
quoting:
In coming from the northward in the Jane Guy [in order to reach Tsalal Island] we had been gradu-
ally leaving behind us the severest regions of ice—this, however little it may be in accordance with the gener-
ally received notions respecting the antarctic, was a fact experience would not permit us to deny. To attempt
getting back, therefore, would be folly—especially at so late a period of the season. Only one course seemed
to be left open for hope. We resolved to steer boldly to the southward, where there was at least a probability
of discovering other lands and more than a probability of finding a still milder climate.
That’s how Pym reasoned it out—as we, a fortiori,* had to do ourselves. Well, on Febru-
ary 29—1828 was a leap year—the escapees reached “the wide and desolate Antarctic Ocean”
beyond the 84th parallel. Now then, it was only December 29. The Halbrane had a jump of two
months on the little boat escaping from Tsalal Island and already under threat from the com-
ing of the long polar winter. What’s more, our well-equipped, well-commanded, well-staffed
schooner inspired more confidence than Pym’s open boat, a willow-timbered canoe fifty feet
long by four to six feet wide and carrying only three tortoises to feed three men.
So I had high hopes for the success of this second leg of our cruise.
. . . we continued on our course, without any incident of moment, for perhaps seven or eight days, during
which period we must have proceeded a vast distance to the southward, as the wind blew constantly with us
and a very strong current set continually in the direction we were pursuing.
Captain Guy knew this passage, having read it many times. I added:
“It says ‘a vast distance,’ and the date was only March 1. Now then, their trip continued
till the 22nd of the same month, and as Pym later recorded, his canoe was moving hideously
fast and ‘hurrying on to the southward under the influence of a powerful current’—that’s how
he described it. From all this, captain, you can see the conclusion to be drawn . . .”
“That he was going to the pole, Mr. Jeorling?”
“Why not—wasn’t he just 400 miles away when he left Tsalal Island?”
“It doesn’t matter in any case!” Len Guy replied. “The Halbrane isn’t here to search for
Pym but for my brother and his companions. If they managed to go ashore on those lands
Peters glimpsed, that’s the one place it’s essential to investigate.”
Captain Guy was right on this particular point. Accordingly I was in constant fear that
he would issue orders to bear east or west. Nevertheless, because the half-breed insisted that his
boat had gone south, that the lands he spoke of lay in that direction, the schooner didn’t change
her heading. If she hadn’t stayed on Pym’s course, I would have been downright devastated.
Besides, I was convinced that if the aforementioned lands did exist, they were to be found
in the highest latitudes.
It isn’t irrelevant to point out that no extraordinary phenomena showed up in the course
of our navigating on January 5–6. We didn’t see anything of that barricade of flickering vapor,
anything of those changes in the sea’s upper strata. As for the water being so tremendously hot
that “the hand could no longer be endured within it,” it must have simmered down a good deal.
Its temperature didn’t exceed 50° Fahrenheit, a level already abnormal in this sector of the antarc-
tic regions.3 And though Peters kept telling me that “if Pym says so, we should believe him,” my
common sense had severe reservations about the reality of those uncanny events. And no, there
wasn’t any veil of mist, or water that had a milky appearance, or downpour of white powder.
In these waterways the two escapees also spotted one of those enormous white animals
that filled the Tsalal islanders with such terror. Under what circumstances had that monster
passed in sight of Pym’s boat? His narrative fails to mention them. And as for marine m ammals,
gigantic birds, or fearsome carnivores from the polar regions, the Halbrane didn’t come across a
single one on her course.
I’ll add that nobody on board fell under that odd spell Pym mentions, a numbness of
body and mind, a sudden listlessness that makes you incapable of the tiniest physical effort.
And does this pathological and physiological condition suggest that he might have imag-
ined those phenomena, that they were simply due to some disturbance of his mental faculties?
Finally, on January 7—according to Peters, who could only guess based on the travel
time—we reached the locality where the savage Nu-Nu lay in the bottom of the canoe and
breathed his last. A date two and a half months after this—March 22—headed up the final
E
ven assuming the oldtimers on the crew agreed with the bosun, chief cook, Cap-
tain Guy, West, and me that the cruise should continue, if the newcomers were
determined to turn back, we couldn’t prevail by force. Fourteen men counting
Peters weren’t enough to take on nineteen. And besides, was it wise to rely on the
ship’s oldtimers? Wouldn’t they have trepidations about navigating through these regions that
seemed outside the circles of the world? Could they stand up to the constant haranguing by
Hearne and his comrades? Wouldn’t they side with them and demand that the ship head back
toward the ice barrier?
And to tell the truth, would Len Guy himself let a cruise go on that wasn’t working
out? Wouldn’t he soon abandon his last hopes of rescuing the Jane’s sailors from those far-off
waterways? Under threat from the coming of the southern winter, its unbearable cold, its
polar storms that his schooner couldn’t withstand, wouldn’t he finally issue orders to change
direction? And what impact would my arguments, pleas, and prayers have if I was the only one
voicing them?
The only one? Not quite! Peters would back me up . . . but who would listen to just the
two of us?
Even if Len Guy still held out, heartbroken at the thought of deserting his brother and
his countrymen, I felt he had to be at the end of his tether. Nevertheless, the schooner didn’t
swerve from the straight line she’d adopted since Tsalal Island. It was as if an underwater lode-
stone were binding her to that longitude the Jane had followed, and Heaven forbid that either
currents or winds caused her to veer off! Though we can master our worries and fears, we must
bow to the forces of nature . . .
I also need to mention a circumstance that was helpful to our southward progress. After
letting up for a few days, the current reappeared at a speed of three to four miles per hour.
Obviously—as Captain Guy pointed out to me—it held sway in this sea, though now and
then it got knocked off course or held in check by countercurrents that were very hard to
T
his is the single word that heads up the 17th chapter in Edgar Allan Poe’s book.1
I thought it would be appropriate to tack on a question mark and have it head up
the twenty-second chapter of my own yarn.2
Did this word, yelled down from the foretop, refer to an island or a conti-
nent? And whichever it was, were we in for a disappointment? Those men we’d come to find in
these latitudes—would they be here? What about Pym, dead, indisputably dead despite what
Peters says—had he ever set foot on these shores?
When a shout rang out aboard the Jane on January 17, 1828—a day packed with inci-
dents, according to Pym’s journal—it went like this:
“Land off the starboard bow!”
Aboard the Halbrane the same words would have applied.
Some shapes were actually taking form to starboard, standing out hazily against the line
between sky and sea.
True, the land those words had announced earlier to the Jane’s seamen was arid, empty
Bennet’s Islet, lying less than a degree north of Tsalal Island—which back then was fertile,
livable, and lived on, the place where Captain Len Guy later hoped to meet up with his coun-
trymen. But this unknown land now facing us, this land five degrees farther into the depths
of the polar seas—what would it mean for our schooner? Was it the destination we desired so
passionately, were searching for so tenaciously? Would the two brothers William and Len Guy
rush to hug each other on these shores? Would the Halbrane reach the end of her voyage, whose
success would be complete when she took the Jane’s survivors back home?
As I’ve indicated, I was after the same thing as the half-breed. Our destination wasn’t just
this destination—nor was this success our success. However, since land lay in front of our eyes,
the first thing we had to do was pull up to it . . . then we would see.
What I should mention right off is that our lookout’s yell created an immediate diver-
sion. I no longer thought about what Peters had just confided in me—and maybe the half-
breed forgot it as well, because he dashed to the bow and glued his eyes to the horizon.
I
had to crawl over the deckhouse floor to reach the door and get out on deck.
Captain Guy had already left his cabin, and the ship was heeling so sharply,
he dragged himself on his knees, holding on as well as he could to the row of
cleats along the bulwarks.
Toward the bow, between the forecastle and the foremast, a couple of heads emerged
from the folds of the fore staysail, which had collapsed like a tent whose ropes just popped
loose.
Hanging onto the starboard rigging were Peters, Hardie, Holt, and Endicott, who had a
stunned look on his black features.
If you can believe it at this juncture, since the 84th parallel he and the bosun had been
gleefully selling the bonuses they were owed at half off!1
A man managed to crawl over to me, the deck slant keeping him from standing up at
even a fifty-degree angle.
It was Hurliguerly, wriggling along like a foretopman on a yardarm.
Stretching out full length, bracing my feet against the door frame, I wasn’t worried any-
more about sliding to the end of the corridor.
I held out a hand to the bosun, and he hauled himself up next to me, not without some
difficulty.
“What’s going on?” I asked him.
“We’re stranded high and dry, Mr. Jeorling.”
“We went aground?” I exclaimed.
“Ground implies land,” the bosun answered wryly, “and you can forget about land,
because there never was any except in that old devil Peters’s imagination!”
“All right—what happened?”
“What happened was an iceberg in the middle of the fog—an iceberg we couldn’t dodge.”
“An iceberg, bosun?”
Its base eroded by contact with warmer waters, the iceberg had gradually risen. Its center
of gravity shifted, and it could regain its balance only by suddenly keeling over, so its bottom
part swung around and ended up above sea level. As it overturned, it acted like the arm of an
enormous lever, scooped up the Halbrane, and carried her off. Many icebergs flip over like this
on the surface of the polar seas, and this is one of the huge risks a ship runs in going near them.
Our schooner had gotten caught in a fissure on the iceberg’s western face. She was listing
to starboard, stern raised, bow lowered. It occurred to us that the tiniest lurch would make her
slide all the way down the iceberg’s slopes into the sea. On the side where she was heeling, the
The Halbrane was only one degree and five minutes—or sixty-five miles—away from the
South Pole.
T
“ o work!” Captain Guy said; and starting that very afternoon, the crew went at it
with everything they had.
We didn’t have a single hour to lose. Every one of us understood that it was
a question of time above all else. Concerning provisions, the schooner still had
enough to allow full rations for another eighteen months. Accordingly we weren’t in any danger
of going hungry—or thirsty either, though the water tanks had ruptured during the crash, and
the liquid they held had leaked out the punctures in their sides.
Luckily the kegs of gin, whiskey, beer, and wine were almost completely intact—they’d
been stored in the section of the hold that suffered the least. We hadn’t experienced any set-
backs on this score, and the iceberg itself would supply us with drinking water.
As you know, whether ice is formed from fresh water or sea water, it doesn’t contain
any salt. During the transformation from a liquid state to a solid one, all sodium chloride is
eliminated. So it doesn’t seem to make much difference which way the ice was formed, the water
coming from it will be drinkable. Even so, we must state a preference for the kind from certain
ice slabs characterized by their slightly greenish tint and perfect transparency. They’re actually
solidified rainwater and infinitely more suitable for drinking purposes.
Accustomed as he was to these polar seas, our captain certainly wouldn’t have had trouble
spotting this type of ice; but he couldn’t find any on our iceberg, since the part that had now
somersaulted into the open was the part that used to be submerged.
At the outset Captain Guy and West decided to lighten the vessel by emptying her com-
pletely. The masts and rigging had to be dismantled, then transferred to a level area. Launching
her would be a difficult and dangerous operation, and it involved getting her weight down as
far as possible, even unloading the ballast. Since the operation needed to be carried out under
optimum conditions, it was better to wait a few days before leaving. We could reload her later
without much difficulty.
After this pressing matter, a second one came up, just as serious. Essentially, it would be
unforgivably reckless to leave our provisions in the Halbrane’s hold, given how precariously she
W
e were stupefied . . . yes, after the schooner had vanished into the depths, carried
off like a boulder in an avalanche, we stood in stupefaction! Not a thing was left
of our Halbrane, not even flotsam and jetsam! Just a second ago she was 100 feet
in the air, now she was 500 feet under the waves! Yes, we stood in stupefaction
without even one thought for the dangers the future had in store . . . it was the stupefaction of
folks who “can’t believe their eyes,” as the saying goes!
Next came shock, a natural result. Nobody screamed, nobody moved. We stood stock-
still, feet frozen to the ice beneath us. No words could describe the horror of our predicament!
As for First Officer West, after the schooner had gone to her doom in the depths, I saw
a large tear fall from his eyes. That Halbrane he’d loved so dearly was now gone forever! He was
a man of the sternest fi ber, and yes, he wept . . .1
Three of our men had just perished, and in the ghastliest manner! I’d seen Rogers and
Gratian, two of our most loyal sailors, frantically reach out their hands, get thrown about as
the schooner bounded downhill, then go to their deaths along with her! As for that other fel-
low from the Falklands, that American she crushed as she went by, he lay in a pool of blood,
a shapeless mass. . . . After our first casualties just ten days ago, we had three more to record in
the death register for this disastrous cruise! Ah, how fortune had smiled on us till the Halbrane
got snatched from her natural element . . . and now we were staggering under fate’s cruelest
blows! And hadn’t this last one hit us hardest of all—wouldn’t it be our deathblow?
Then thunderous outcries broke the silence, yells of despair worthy of this irreparable
calamity! And surely more than one man told himself he would have been better off aboard the
Halbrane as she bounded down the iceberg’s flanks! He would have gotten it over and done with,
like Rogers and Gratian! The recklessness and stupidity of this deranged expedition could lead
to only one logical outcome!
Finally the instinct for self-preservation prevailed, and though Hearne stood to one side
and made a point of keeping quiet, his comrades started shouting:
O
ur circumstances had unexpectedly changed! We weren’t stranded at that local-
ity anymore—what would the consequences be? After getting stalled near the
intersection of the 39th meridian and the 89th parallel, now we were riding the
current in the direction of the pole! So our initial feelings of delight gave way to
a wholesale fear of the unknown—and what an unknown!
Maybe only Peters was overjoyed at the thought of resuming this course, which he insist-
ed would turn up traces of his poor Pym! As for his companions, they had other ideas running
through their heads!
In fact Len Guy no longer held out any hope of picking up his countrymen. William
Guy and his five sailors had left Tsalal Island at least eight months ago, there were no doubts
on that score . . . but where had they taken refuge? In thirty-five days we’d covered a distance of
some 400 miles without finding a thing. Even if they could have reached this polar continent
(which my clever countryman Maury theorizes is about 2,500 miles wide), what part of it
should be the stage for our investigations? And besides, if this end of the earth’s axis is washed
by a sea, hadn’t the Jane’s survivors gone to the bottom by now, and wouldn’t a carapace of ice
soon cover them over?
Therefore, since we’d run out of hope, it was Captain Guy’s sworn duty to take his crew
north again and cut the Antarctic Circle while the weather was still amenable—and here we
were, sweeping southward . . .
As I’ve noted, the drift took the iceberg in that direction after we started moving, and it
wasn’t long before we got terrified all over again.
And here’s what everybody needed to understand: though we weren’t stranded anymore,
we still had to resign ourselves to wintering here for a good while, trusting to luck that we
might bump into one of the whalers busy fishing between the South Orkneys, South Georgia
Island, and the Sandwich group.
Two conclusions could be drawn from the specifics he’d worked up.
First, since the last readings he’d taken to fix our longitude, the current had tossed us
about twenty-four degrees back into the southeast.3
Second, our iceberg wasn’t much more than forty miles from the South Pole.
Over the course of that day, we transferred the better part of the cargo to a wide crevice
the bosun had discovered in our eastern flank—there the crates and barrels would be safe even
in the event of another collision. As for the kitchen stove, our men helped Endicott set it up
between two ice slabs that kept it securely braced, then they piled several tons of coal close by.
Nobody did any whining or muttering while carrying out these various tasks. Clearly the
crew were content to hold their tongues. They obeyed Captain Guy and his first officer because
they weren’t ordered to do anything that didn’t urgently need doing. Now then, in the fullness
of time wouldn’t our men end up getting discouraged again? As yet they weren’t disputing their
leaders’ authority, but where would they stand in a few days? Needless to say, we could depend
on the bosun, on Master Hardie if not Master Holt, and maybe two or three of the oldtimers.
As for the others, especially the Falkland recruits who didn’t think this disastrous cruise would
ever end—could they resist the temptation to grab the dinghy and make a run for it?
To my mind, however, this eventuality wasn’t worth worrying about so long as our ice-
berg kept drifting, because the longboat wouldn’t have made better time. But if we should go
aground yet again, if we got beached on some continent or island, what lengths would the poor
fellows go to, trying to escape the horrors of wintering down here?
This was the topic of conversation during our noon meal. Len Guy and Jem West agreed
that the master sealer and his companions wouldn’t attempt anything so long as this floating
mass stayed in motion. Even so, we were realistic to not relax our vigilance for a single instant.
Hearne aroused too many justifiable suspicions for us to not watch him around the clock.
That afternoon, during the crew’s scheduled rest hour, I had another chat with Dirk
Peters.
I’d taken my usual seat on top of the iceberg, while Captain Guy and his first officer
went down to its base to work up draft marks at its waterline. Twice every twenty-four hours
they had to examine those marks, trying to see if the iceberg’s draft of water was increasing or
decreasing—in other words, if its center of gravity was rising and threatening to make it flip
over again.
I’d been sitting for half an hour when I saw the half-breed climbing quickly up the slopes.
Was he coming—he too—in hopes of sighting land by studying the farthest reaches of
the horizon? Or (which struck me as more likely) did he have some plan concerning Pym that
he wanted to tell me about?
*What Mr. Jeorling didn’t manage to even glimpse, another man viewed twenty-eight years later—on March 21,
1868, that other man set foot on this part of the globe. The season was seven weeks farther along, and the polar
winter had already left its mark on these desolate regions, which would soon be covered by six months of darkness.
But this hardly mattered to the extraordinary mariner we’re recalling here. He could brave the cold and the storms in
his marvelous submersible. After clearing the ice barrier and passing under the Antarctic Ocean’s frozen carapace, he
managed to advance as far as latitude 90°. There his skiff dropped him off on a volcanic shore littered with basaltic
rubble, slag, ash, lava, and blackish boulders. The surface of this seacoast teemed with such marine animals as seals
and walruses. Flying overhead were countless flocks of sheathbills, kingfishers, and gigantic petrels, while rows of
penguins stood in line and didn’t budge. Then, in the midst of crumbling glacial deposits and pumice stones, this
mysterious individual scaled the steep slopes of a half-crystal, half-basalt peak and reached the tip of the South Pole.
And right when the northern horizon cut the sun’s disk into two equal parts, he claimed this continent in his own
name, unfurling a flag with a gold N embroidered on its bunting. The name of the submersible floating offshore was
the Nautilus, and the name of her commander was Captain Nemo. J.V.
W
“ ell, Mr. Jeorling,” the bosun told me, “when you and I meet again tomorrow, we’ll
have to say good-bye!”1
“What do you mean, Hurliguerly?”
“Good-bye to seeing the South Pole—we haven’t spotted even the tip of it!”
“True . . . and by now it must be some twenty miles astern.”
“What did you expect? The south wind snuffed out our overhead light just as we passed
the place.”
“And we won’t get another chance, I imagine.”
“Afraid not, Mr. Jeorling. The earth’ll just keep turning on her skewer and we’ll never
find out what’s cooking!”
“You come up with such eloquent metaphors, bosun.”
“And in addition I’ll point out that our chariot of ice is carting us to the devil, with
no stopovers at the Green Cormorant! Let’s face it, this was a pointless cruise . . . a wasted
cruise . . . a cruise we won’t try again anytime soon . . . a cruise, in any case, to wrap up without
further ado! Because winter’ll soon be poking his red nose, chapped lips, and frostbitten hands
into it—this cruise where Captain Guy didn’t find his brother, us our countrymen, or Peters
his poor Pym!”
It was true, every bit of it—this was what we had to show after all those problems,
setbacks, and letdowns! In addition to losing the Halbrane, this expedition had already run up
nine casualties. Thirty-two men had set sail on the schooner, now we were down to twenty-
three . . . and how much lower would the figure go?
In fact we reckoned the distance from the South Pole to the Antarctic Circle at about
twenty degrees, hence nearly 1,400 miles, and we would need to cover them in a month to six
weeks at the outside—or be locked in when the ice barrier solidified again!2 As for wintering
in this part of Antarctica, none of us would live to tell of it.
Besides, we’d abandoned all hope of picking up the Jane’s survivors, and the crew had only
one wish: to cross these fearful, lonely wastes as fast as possible. Our southbound drift to the
The iceberg was about four degrees beyond the antarctic pole, and we’d gone from longi-
tude west—where our schooner had followed on the Jane’s heels—to longitude east.
B
y a little past noon, land lay no more than a mile off. The unanswered question
was whether or not the current would take us beyond it.
I have to admit, if we’d had the choice of pulling up to that shoreline or
staying in motion, I’m not sure which would have been preferable.
I was talking it over with Captain Guy and his first officer when West interrupted me,
saying:
“Mr. Jeorling, what’s the point of discussing this possibility, may I ask?”
“Yes, what’s the point, since our hands are tied,” Len Guy added. “Maybe the iceberg will
blunder into that coastline, or maybe we’ll sidestep it if we keep riding the current.”
“True,” I went on, “but my question’s still on the table. Are we better off leaving this
iceberg or staying on it?”
“Staying on it,” West answered.
Actually, if the dinghy could have taken everybody plus provisions for a five-to-six-week
trip, we would have launched it without hesitation, struck out across the open sea, and benefit-
ed from the northbound wind. But since the dinghy could handle only eleven or twelve men at
best, we would need to draw straws. And think of the men who would be left behind—weren’t
they doomed to die of cold, if not hunger, in this region that winter would soon bury under
ice and vile weather?
Now then, if our iceberg kept drifting in the same direction, it would, after all, do an
acceptable job of taking us most of the way back. True, our chariot of ice could let us down
by getting stuck again, even somersaulting, or falling in with some countercurrent that would
take it off course . . . whereas our dinghy could tack with the wind when it became contrary
and carry us to our destination—assuming storms left it alone and the ice barrier offered it a
way through.
But as West just said, what was the use of discussing this possibility?
And an additional result was the absolute stillness, which revealed that the only living
things at this locality weren’t alarmed by our presence. The seals and walruses didn’t dive under-
water, the petrels and cormorants didn’t fly off in a flurry of wings, the penguins stood in line
without moving, probably viewing us as some weird species of flightless bird. Yes, this definitely
was the first time they’d laid eyes on a human being—proof they’d never left these shores to
venture into the lower latitudes.
When we got back to the beach, the bosun was tickled to discover several spacious cav-
erns hollowed out of the granite cliffside, some with enough room to house all of us, others
with enough to hold the Halbrane’s cargo. Whatever decisions we might make in the future, we
T
hat settled the issue of how we would spend the winter. Out of thirty-three
men who’d left the Falklands aboard the Halbrane, twenty-three had arrived on
these shores, and out of those, thirteen had just taken off for the whaling waters
beyond the ice barrier . . . and fate hadn’t done the selecting! Not at all! To avoid
the horrors of wintering down here, they’d shamefully deserted us!1
Unfortunately, Hearne hadn’t taken just his comrades along. Two of our original crew
had joined him, seaman Burry and Martin Holt, our master sailmaker—and maybe Holt
wasn’t responsible for his actions while reeling from the frightful impact of what the master
sealer had revealed to him!
By and large things hadn’t changed for the ones doomed to stay behind. We were only
nine in number—Captain Len Guy, First Officer Jem West, Hurliguerly the bosun, Hardie the
master caulker, Endicott the cook, the two seamen Francis and Stern, Dirk Peters, and myself.
What ordeals were in store for us that winter as the horrid polar weather came on! What fright-
ful temperatures we would have to face—more severe than anywhere else on the planet earth,
shrouded in permanent night for six long months! Conditions down here are beyond human
endurance, and it’s appalling to think how much strength of mind and body it would take to
withstand them!
And yet, all things considered, were the chances of those who’d set out any better? Would
they find open sea as far as the ice barrier? Would they succeed in reaching the Antarctic Circle?
And beyond it would they find any ships left over from fishing season? Would they run short
of provisions during the course of their thousand-mile trip? How much could the dinghy carry,
given that it was already overloaded with thirteen people? All right, were they in greater danger
or were we? Answer: time would tell.
When the longboat was out of sight, Captain Guy and his companions climbed back up
the promontory, returning to the cavern. There, surrounded by perpetual night, we were going
to spend all winter, during which he would forbid us to set foot outdoors!
A
s the title given this chapter indicates, it will briefly describe the adventures of
William Guy and his companions after their English schooner was destroyed,
including the details of their lives on Tsalal Island following the departure of
Pym and Peters.
Transferring them to the cavern, we managed to bring William Guy and the other three
seamen—Trinkle, Roberts, and Covin—back to life. In reality it was hunger and nothing else
that had reduced these poor devils to a weakened state close to death.
Moderate portions of a little food, plus a few cups of hot tea spiked with whiskey,
restored their strength almost immediately.
I won’t dwell on the emotional moment, which touched us to the depths of our souls,
when William recognized his brother Len. Tears came to our eyes at the same instant that
thanks to Providence came to our lips. We were so delighted just then, we didn’t give a thought
to what the future had in store for us—and who knows, maybe circumstances were about to
change, thanks to that craft’s arrival on the shores of Halbrane Land.
I need to mention that before William Guy launched into his story, we brought him up
to date on our own adventures. In a few words he learned what he was dying to learn—our
discovery of Patterson’s corpse, our schooner’s voyage to Tsalal Island, her setting sail for higher
latitudes, her capsizing at the foot of the iceberg, lastly the treachery of part of her crew, who’d
ditched us on these shores.
In addition, he found out what Peters knew concerning Pym, also the baseless theories
underlying the half-breed’s hopes for tracking down his companion, whose death William Guy
didn’t doubt any more than he did the deaths of the Jane’s other seamen, whose crushed bodies
lay under the hills by Klock-klock.
William Guy responded to this narrative with a summary of the eleven years he spent
on Tsalal Island.
T
wo days later not a single survivor of the two lost schooners still remained on
that part of the antarctic coastline.1
On February 21 at six o’clock in the morning, the craft carrying us—we
were thirteen in number—exited the little cove and doubled the promontory
overlooking Halbrane Land.
For the past two days, we’d been debating the issue of leaving the place. If we were to
decide this in the affirmative, it wouldn’t do to procrastinate a single day before setting out.
For one more month—one month at the outside—it would be possible to navigate this sec-
tion of sea lying between the 86th and 70th parallels, in other words, up to those latitudes
normally closed off by the ice barrier. Then, assuming we got through, might we have a chance
beyond it of finding some whaler finishing out the fishing season—or, who knows, maybe an
English, French, or American vessel completing an exploratory cruise on the outskirts of the
polar ocean? After mid-March we would have to abandon any hope of being picked up, because
those waterways would be as devoid of mariners as fishermen.
First we asked ourselves if we wouldn’t be better off holing up where we were, as we had
to do before William Guy arrived—staying put for the seven or eight months of winter in this
region, soon to be invaded by a long period of darkness and stupendous cold. Early next sum-
mer, once the sea was open again, the canoe could set out for the Pacific Ocean, and we would
have more time to cover the thousand miles we needed to go. Wouldn’t this be a shrewd and
sensible move?
However, as accepting as we were, who wouldn’t shudder at the thought of wintering
on this coast—though the cavern offered us ample protection, though life’s necessities were
guaranteed us, at least with regard to food? Yes, we accepted our lot—so long as acceptance was
what circumstances called for! But now an opportunity to leave had come up, and who wouldn’t
make a last-ditch effort to get back to civilization, who wouldn’t attempt what Hearne and his
companions had attempted, and under vastly more promising conditions?
*Hansteen’s calculations put the southern magnetic pole in longitude 128° 30' and latitude 69° 17'. Following
the efforts of Vincendon Dumoulin and Coupvent-Desbois at the time of Dumont d’Urville’s voyage with the
Astrolabe and the Zealous, Duperrey came up with longitude 136° 15' and latitude 76° 30'. Quite recently, however,
new calculations have insisted that this spot ought to lie in longitude 106° 16' east and latitude 72° 20' south. As
you can see, marine mapmakers still haven’t reached agreement on this issue, just as they haven’t with regard to the
northern magnetic pole. J.V.
Therefore, on this date of March 12, the Barracuda was no farther than 400 miles from
the waterways of the Antarctic Circle.
We noted at this juncture that the strait—quite narrow level with the 77th parallel—was
widening as it headed north. Even with a telescope you couldn’t see land to the east anymore.
This was an inconvenient state of affairs, because the current might spread out between the two
shores, quickly lose speed, and cease to be a factor.
During the night of March 12–13, there was a lull in the wind, then a pretty heavy fog
came up. We had grounds for complaint, because this heightened the danger of colliding with
floating ice. True, we weren’t surprised to see these waterways mist over. But the thing that did
surprise us was that our canoe, far from slowing down, was gradually accelerating, even though
the wind had lulled. Certainly it wasn’t the current that made us speed up, because the waves
rippling against our prow proved we were going faster than it was.
This state of things lasted till morning without our figuring out what was going on,
then, at about ten o’clock, the fog started to break up in the lower zones. The seacoast to the
west reappeared (a rocky seacoast with no mountains in the background), and the Barracuda
hugged it.
And then, a quarter of a mile off, a mass of stone stood out, towering 100 yards above
the plain and measuring 400 to 600 yards around. The strange shape of that rock formation
made it instantly resemble an enormous sphinx, deep chested, paws out in front, squatting in
the posture of that winged monster stationed on the road to Thebes in Greek myth.
Was it a live animal, a gigantic monster, some mastodon a thousand times bigger than
those enormous elephants whose remains are still found in the polar regions? In our frame of
mind, we could well believe this—and also believe that this mastodon was ready to rush at our
vessel, get her in its clutches, and crush her . . .
This unreasoning, unreasonable fear was our initial reaction, then the fog lifted from the
thing, and we verified that it was a rock formation of unusual shape.
Yes, a sphinx! And I’d just remembered! During that night when the iceberg somersaulted
and carried off the Halbrane, I’d been dreaming that a fantastic animal of this kind was sitting
T
he afternoon of that same day, the Barracuda left the shores of Sphinx Country
behind, shores we’d continually had to our west since February 21.
There were about 400 miles to go till the edge of the Antarctic Circle.
After we arrived in the waterways of the Pacific Ocean, would we have the good
luck, I repeat, to get picked up by a whaler still at work in the last days of the fishing season,
or even by some ship on a polar expedition?
This second possibility had something to be said for it. In essence, while our schooner
lay over in the Falklands, wasn’t America’s Lieutenant Wilkes in the picture with his naval expe-
dition? Hadn’t his squadron—consisting of four vessels, the Vincennes, Peacock, Porpoise, and Flying
Fish—left Tierra del Fuego in February 1839 and gone off with several consorts on a cruise
through the polar seas?
As for what had happened since, we didn’t have a clue. But after Wilkes attempted to sail
southward in the western longitudes, wouldn’t he look for a way to do the same in the eastern
longitudes?* If so, it might be possible for the Barracuda to meet up with one of his vessels.
By and large our hardest task would be getting out of these regions before winter took
over, making the most of the sea being open, because it soon would be impossible to sail at all.
When Dirk Peters died, the Barracuda’s passengers shrank to a total of twelve. This is
what remained from both crews of the two schooners, the first consisting of thirty-eight men,
the second thirty-two—seventy in all! But don’t forget, the Halbrane’s expedition had been
undertaken as a humanitarian responsibility, and the Jane’s four survivors owed their lives to it.
And now let’s pick up the pace. There’s no point in dwelling on our return trip, which was
blessed with steady winds and currents. Incidentally, these notes that would serve as the basis
for my narrative weren’t stuck inside a bottle, tossed overboard, and fished up by chance from
the seas of Antarctica. I’ve brought them back in person, and though we didn’t accomplish the
*Sure enough, that’s what he did: after being forced to backtrack thirteen times, Lieutenant Charles Wilkes1 man-
aged to take the Vincennes as far as latitude 65° 57' 2 and longitude 105° 20' east. J.V.
The Narrative of
Arthur
Gordon Pym
of Nantucket
Edgar Allan Poe
U
pon my return to the United States a few months ago, after the extraordinary se-
ries of adventures in the South Seas and elsewhere, of which an account is given
in the following pages, accident threw me into the society of several gentlemen
in Richmond, Va., who felt deep interest in all matters relating to the regions I
had visited, and who were constantly urging it upon me, as a duty, to give my narrative to the
public. I had several reasons, however, for declining to do so, some of which were of a nature
altogether private and concern no person but myself; others not so much so. One consideration
which deterred me was that, having kept no journal during a greater portion of the time in
which I was absent, I feared I should not be able to write, from mere memory, a statement so
minute and connected as to have the appearance of that truth it would really possess, barring only
the natural and unavoidable exaggeration to which all of us are prone when detailing events
which have had powerful influence in exciting the imaginative faculties. Another reason was that
the incidents to be narrated were of a nature so positively marvelous that, unsupported as my
assertions must necessarily be (except by the evidence of a single individual, and he a half-breed
Indian), I could only hope for belief among my family and those of my friends who have had
reason, through life, to put faith in my veracity—the probability being that the public at large
would regard what I should put forth as merely an impudent and ingenious fiction. A distrust
in my own abilities as a writer was, nevertheless, one of the principal causes which prevented
me from complying with the suggestions of my advisers.
Among those gentlemen in Virginia who expressed the greatest interest in my statement,
more particularly in regard to that portion of it which related to the Antarctic Ocean, was Mr.
Poe, lately editor of the Southern Literary Messenger, a monthly magazine published by Mr. Thomas
W. White in the city of Richmond. He strongly advised me, among others, to prepare at once
a full account of what I had seen and undergone, and trust to the shrewdness and common
sense of the public—insisting, with great plausibility, that however roughly, as regards mere
authorship, my book should be got up, its very uncouthness, if there were any, would give it all
the better chance of being received as truth.
A. G. PYM.
New York, July 1838.
MY name is Arthur Gordon Pym. My father was a respectable trader in sea stores at Nantucket,
where I was born. My maternal grandfather was an attorney in good practice. He was fortunate
in everything and had speculated very successfully in stocks of the Edgarton New Bank, as it
was formerly called. By these and other means he had managed to lay by a tolerable sum of
money. He was more attached to myself, I believe, than to any other person in the world, and
I expected to inherit the most of his property at his death. He sent me, at six years of age, to
the school of old Mr. Ricketts, a gentleman with only one arm and of eccentric manners—he
is well known to almost every person who has visited New Bedford. I stayed at his school until
I was sixteen, when I left him for Mr. E. Ronald’s academy on the hill. Here I became intimate
with the son of Mr. Barnard, a sea captain who generally sailed in the employ of Lloyd and
Vredenburgh—Mr. Barnard is also very well known in New Bedford and has many relations, I
am certain, in Edgarton. His son was named Augustus, and he was nearly two years older than
myself. He had been on a whaling voyage with his father in the John Donaldson and was always
talking to me of his adventures in the south Pacific Ocean. I used frequently to go home with
him and remain all day, and sometimes all night. We occupied the same bed, and he would
be sure to keep me awake until almost light, telling me stories of the natives of the Island of
Tinian and other places he had visited in his travels. At last I could not help being interested in
what he said, and by degrees I felt the greatest desire to go to sea. I owned a sailboat called the
Ariel and worth about seventy-five dollars. She had a half-deck, or cuddy, and was rigged sloop
fashion—I forget her tonnage, but she would hold ten persons without much crowding. In this
boat we were in the habit of going on some of the maddest freaks in the world; and when I now
think of them, it appears to me a thousand wonders that I am alive today.
I will relate one of these adventures by way of introduction to a longer and more mo-
mentous narrative. One night there was a party at Mr. Barnard’s, and both Augustus and myself
were not a little intoxicated toward the close of it. As usual, in such cases, I took part of his
bed in preference to going home. He went to sleep, as I thought, very quietly (it being near
In spite of the danger of the attempt, the mate clung to the main chains as soon as they came
within his reach. Another huge lurch now brought the starboard side of the vessel out of water
nearly as far as her keel, when the cause of his anxiety was rendered obvious enough. The body
of a man was seen to be affixed in the most singular manner to the smooth and shining bot-
tom (the Penguin was coppered and copper-fastened), and beating violently against it with every
In no affairs of mere prejudice, pro or con, do we deduce inferences with entire certainty even
from the most simple data. It might be supposed that a catastrophe such as I have just related
would have effectually cooled my incipient passion for the sea. On the contrary, I never expe-
rienced a more ardent longing for the wild adventures incident to the life of a navigator than
within a week after our miraculous deliverance. This short period proved amply long enough
to erase from my memory the shadows and bring out in vivid light all the pleasurably exciting
points of color, all the picturesqueness of the late perilous accident. My conversations with
Augustus grew daily more frequent and more intensely full of interest. He had a manner of
relating his stories of the ocean (more than one half of which I now suspect to have been sheer
fabrications) well adapted to have weight with one of my enthusiastic temperament and some-
what gloomy, although glowing, imagination. It is strange, too, that he most strongly enlisted
The thought instantly occurred to me that the paper was a note from Augustus, and that some
unaccountable accident having happened to prevent his relieving me from my dungeon, he had
devised this method of acquainting me with the true state of affairs. Trembling with eagerness,
I now commenced another search for my phosphorus matches and tapers. I had a confused rec-
ollection of having put them carefully away just before falling asleep; and, indeed, previous to
my last journey to the trap, I had been able to remember the exact spot where I had deposited
them.6 But now I endeavored in vain to call it to mind and busied myself for a full hour in a
fruitless and vexatious search for the missing articles; never, surely, was there a more tantalizing
state of anxiety and suspense. At length, while groping about with my head close to the bal-
last, near the opening of the box and outside of it, I perceived a faint glimmering of light in
the direction of the steerage. Greatly surprised, I endeavored to make my way toward it, as it
appeared to be but a few feet from my position. Scarcely had I moved with this intention, when
I lost sight of the glimmer entirely and, before I could bring it into view again, was obliged to
feel along by the box until I had exactly resumed my original situation. Now, moving my head
with caution to and fro, I found that, by proceeding slowly, with great care, in an opposite
direction to that in which I had at first started, I was enabled to draw near the light, still keep-
ing it in view. Presently I came directly upon it (having squeezed my way through innumerable
narrow windings) and found that it proceeded from some fragments of my matches lying in
an empty barrel turned upon its side. I was wondering how they came in such a place, when
my hand fell upon two or three pieces of taper wax, which had been evidently mumbled by the
dog. I concluded at once that he had devoured the whole of my supply of candles, and I felt
hopeless of being ever able to read the note of Augustus. The small remnants of the wax were
so mashed up among other rubbish in the barrel, that I despaired of deriving any service from
them and left them as they were. The phosphorus, of which there was only a speck or two, I
gathered up as well as I could and returned with it, after much difficulty, to my box where Tiger
had all the while remained.
What to do next I could not tell. The hold was so intensely dark that I could not see
my hand, however close I would hold it to my face. The white slip of paper could barely be
discerned, and not even that when I looked at it directly; by turning the exterior portions of
the retina toward it, that is to say, by surveying it slightly askance, I found that it became in
some measure perceptible. Thus the gloom of my prison may be imagined, and the note of my
friend, if indeed it were a note from him, seemed only likely to throw me into further trouble
by disquieting to no purpose my already enfeebled and agitated mind. In vain I revolved in
The brig put to sea, as I had supposed, in about an hour after he had left the watch. This was
on the twentieth of June. It will be remembered that I had then been in the hold for three days;
and, during this period, there was so constant a bustle on board, and so much running to and
fro, especially in the cabin and staterooms, that he had had no chance of visiting me without
the risk of having the secret of the trap discovered. When at length he did come, I had assured
him that I was doing as well as possible; and, therefore, for the two next days he felt but little
uneasiness on my account—still, however, watching an opportunity of going down. It was not
until the fourth day that he found one. Several times during this interval he had made up his mind
to let his father know of the adventure and have me come up at once; but we were still within
reaching distance of Nantucket, and it was doubtful, from some expressions which had escaped
Captain Barnard, whether he would not immediately put back if he discovered me to be on
board. Besides, upon thinking the matter over, Augustus, so he told me, could not imagine
that I was in immediate want, or that I would hesitate in such case to make myself heard at
the trap. When, therefore, he considered everything, he concluded to let me stay until he could
meet with an opportunity of visiting me unobserved. This, as I said before, did not occur until
the fourth day after his bringing me the watch, and the seventh since I had first entered the
hold. He then went down without taking with him any water or provisions, intending in the
first place merely to call my attention and get me to come from the box to the trap—when
he would go up to the stateroom and thence hand me down a supply. When he descended for
this purpose he found that I was asleep, for it seems that I was snoring very loudly. From all
the calculations I can make on the subject, this must have been the slumber into which I fell
just after my return from the trap with the watch and which, consequently, must have lasted for
more than three entire days and nights at the very least. Latterly, I have had reason, both from my own
experience and the assurance of others, to be acquainted with the strong soporific effects of the
stench arising from old fish oil when closely confined; and when I think of the condition of
the hold in which I was imprisoned, and the long period during which the brig had been used
as a whaling vessel, I am more inclined to wonder that I awoke at all, after once falling asleep,
than that I should have slept uninterruptedly for the period specified above.
Augustus called to me at first in a low voice and without closing the trap—but I made
him no reply. He then shut the trap, and spoke to me in a louder, and finally in a very loud
tone—still I continued to snore. He was now at a loss what to do. It would take him some
time to make his way through the lumber to my box, and in the meanwhile his absence would
For some minutes after the cook had left the forecastle, Augustus abandoned himself to de-
spair, never hoping to leave the berth alive. He now came to the resolution of acquainting the
first of the men who should come down with my situation, thinking it better to let me take my
chance with the mutineers than perish of thirst in the hold—for it had been ten days since I
was first imprisoned, and my jug of water was not a plentiful supply even for four. As he was
thinking on this subject, the idea came all at once into his head that it might be possible to
communicate with me by the way of the main hold. In any other circumstances, the difficulty
and hazard of the undertaking would have prevented him from attempting it; but now he had,
at all events, little prospect of life and consequently little to lose—he bent his whole mind,
therefore, upon the task.
His handcuffs were the first consideration. At first he saw no method of removing
them and feared that he should thus be baffled at the very outset; but, upon a closer scrutiny,
he discovered that the irons could be slipped off and on at pleasure with very little effort or
inconvenience, merely by squeezing his hands through them—this species of manacle being
altogether ineffectual in confining young persons, in whom the smaller bones readily yield to
pressure. He now untied his feet and, leaving the cord in such a manner that it could easily
be readjusted in the event of any person’s coming down, proceeded to examine the bulkhead
where it joined the berth. The partition here was of soft pine board, an inch thick, and he saw
that he should have little trouble in cutting his way through. A voice was now heard at the
forecastle companionway, and he had just time to put his right hand into its handcuff (the
left had not been removed) and to draw the rope in a slipknot around his ankle, when Dirk
Peters came below, followed by Tiger who immediately leaped into the berth and lay down.
The dog had been brought on board by Augustus, who knew my attachment to the animal
and thought it would give me pleasure to have him with me during the voyage. He went up
to our house for him immediately after first taking me into the hold but did not think of
*Half-breed. FPW
The leading particulars of this narration were all that Augustus communicated to me while we
remained near the box. It was not until afterward that he entered fully into all the details. He
was apprehensive of being missed, and I was wild with impatience to leave my detested place
of confinement. We resolved to make our way at once to the hole in the bulkhead, near which
I was to remain for the present while he went through to reconnoiter. To leave Tiger in the box
was what neither of us could endure to think of; yet, how to act otherwise was the question. He
*Whaling vessels are usually fitted with iron oil tanks—why the Grampus was not I have never been able to ascertain.
July 10th. Spoke a brig from Rio bound to Norfolk. Weather hazy with a light baffling wind
from the eastward. Today Hartman Rogers died, having been attacked on the eighth with
spasms after drinking a glass of grog. This man was of the cook’s party and one upon whom
Peters placed his main reliance. He told Augustus that he believed the mate had poisoned him
and that he expected, if he did not be on the lookout, his own turn would come shortly. There
were now only himself, Jones, and the cook belonging to his own gang—on the other side there
were five. He had spoken to Jones about taking the command from the mate; but the project
having been coolly received, he had been deterred from pressing the matter any further, or from
saying anything to the cook. It was well, as it happened, that he was so prudent, for in the af-
ternoon the cook expressed his determination of siding with the mate and went over formally
to that party, while Jones took an opportunity of quarreling with Peters and hinted that he
would let the mate know of the plan in agitation. There was now, evidently, no time to be lost,
and Peters expressed his determination of attempting to take the vessel at all hazards, provided
Augustus would lend him his aid. My friend at once assured him of his willingness to enter
into any plan for that purpose and, thinking the opportunity a favorable one, made known the
fact of my being on board. At this the hybrid was not more astonished than delighted, as he
had no reliance whatever upon Jones, whom he already considered as belonging to the party of
the mate. They went below immediately, when Augustus called to me by name, and Peters and
myself were soon made acquainted. It was agreed that we should attempt to retake the vessel
upon the first good opportunity, leaving Jones altogether out of our councils. In the event of
success we were to run the brig into the first port that offered and deliver her up. The desertion
of his party had frustrated Peters’s design of going into the Pacific—an adventure which could
not be accomplished without a crew, and he depended upon either getting acquitted upon trial
on the score of insanity (which he solemnly averred had actuated him in lending his aid to the
mutiny), or upon obtaining a pardon, if found guilty, through the representations of Augustus
and myself. Our deliberations were interrupted for the present by the cry of “All hands take in
sail,” and Peters and Augustus ran up on deck.
As usual, the crew were nearly all drunk; and, before sail could be properly taken in, a
violent squall laid the brig on her beam-ends. By keeping her away, however, she righted, having
shipped a good deal of water. Scarcely was everything secure, when another squall took the
vessel, and immediately afterward another—no damage being done. There was every appear-
ance of a gale of wind, which, indeed, shortly came on with great fury from the northward
and westward. All was made as snug as possible, and we laid to, as usual, under a close-reefed
foresail. As night drew on, the wind increased in violence with a remarkably heavy sea. Peters
now came into the forecastle with Augustus, and we resumed our deliberations.
We agreed that no opportunity could be more favorable than the present for carrying
our designs into effect, as an attempt at such a moment would never be anticipated. As the brig
was snugly laid to, there would be no necessity of maneuvering her until good weather, when,
if we succeeded in our attempt, we might liberate one, or perhaps two of the men, to aid us in
As I viewed myself in a fragment of looking glass which hung up in the cabin, and by the dim
light of a kind of battle lantern, I was so impressed with a sense of vague awe at my appear-
ance, and at the recollection of the terrific reality which I was thus representing, that I was
seized with a violent tremor and could scarcely summon resolution to go on with my part. It
was necessary, however, to act with decision, and Peters and myself went up on deck.
We there found everything safe, and keeping close to the bulwarks, the three of us crept
to the cabin companionway. It was only partially closed, precautions having been taken to
prevent its being suddenly pushed to from without, by means of placing billets of wood on
the upper step so as to interfere with the shutting. We found no difficulty in getting a full view
of the interior of the cabin through the cracks where the hinges were placed. It now proved to
have been very fortunate for us that we had not attempted to take them by surprise, for they
were evidently on the alert. Only one was asleep, and he lying just at the foot of the companion
ladder with a musket by his side. The rest were seated on several mattresses, which had been
taken from the berths and thrown on the floor. They were engaged in earnest conversation; and
although they had been carousing, as appeared from two empty jugs with some tin tumblers
which lay about, they were not as much intoxicated as usual. All had knives, one or two of them
pistols, and a great many muskets were lying in a berth close at hand.
We listened to their conversation for some time before we could make up our minds how
to act, having as yet resolved on nothing determinate except that we would attempt to paralyze
their exertions, when we should attack them, by means of the apparition of Rogers. They were
discussing their piratical plans, in which all we could hear distinctly was that they would unite
with the crew of a schooner Hornet and, if possible, get the schooner herself into their posses-
sion preparatory to some attempt on a large scale, the particulars of which could not be made
out by either of us.
One of the men spoke of Peters, when the mate replied to him in a low voice which
could not be distinguished, and afterward added more loudly that “he could not understand
his being so much forward with the captain’s brat in the forecastle, and he thought the sooner
both of them were overboard the better.” To this no answer was made, but we could easily per-
ceive that the hint was well received by the whole party and more particularly by Jones. At this
period I was excessively agitated, the more so as I could see that neither Augustus nor Peters
could determine how to act. I made up my mind, however, to sell my life as dearly as possible
and not to suffer myself to be overcome by any feelings of trepidation.
The tremendous noise, made by the roaring of the wind in the rigging and the washing
of the sea over the deck, prevented us from hearing what was said except during momentary
lulls. In one of these we all distinctly heard the mate tell one of the men to “go forward, and
order the d–––d lubbers to come into the cabin where he could have an eye upon them, for
he wanted no such secret doings on board the brig.” It was well for us that the pitching of the
vessel at this moment was so violent as to prevent this order from being carried into instant
execution. The cook got up from his mattress to go for us, when a tremendous lurch, which
Luckily, just before night, all four of us had lashed ourselves firmly to the fragments of the
windlass, lying in this manner as flat upon the deck as possible. This precaution alone saved us
from destruction. As it was, we were all more or less stunned by the immense weight of water
which tumbled upon us, and which did not roll from above us until we were nearly exhausted.
As soon as I could recover breath, I called aloud to my companions. Augustus alone replied,
10
Shortly afterward an incident occurred which I am induced to look upon as more intensely
productive of emotion, as far more replete with the extremes first of delight and then of horror,
than even any of the thousand chances which afterward befell me in nine long years, crowded
with events of the most startling and, in many cases, of the most unconceived and inconceivable
character. We were lying on the deck near the companionway and debating the possibility of yet
making our way into the storeroom, when, looking toward Augustus who lay fronting myself, I
perceived that he had become all at once deadly pale and that his lips were quivering in the most
singular and unaccountable manner. Greatly alarmed, I spoke to him, but he made me no reply,
and I was beginning to think that he was suddenly taken ill, when I took notice of his eyes, which
were glaring apparently at some object behind me. I turned my head and shall never forget the
ecstatic joy which thrilled through every particle of my frame, when I perceived a large brig bear-
ing down upon us and not more than a couple of miles off. I sprang to my feet as if a musket
bullet had suddenly struck me to the heart and, stretching out my arms in the direction of the
vessel, stood in this manner, motionless and unable to articulate a syllable. Peters and Parker
were equally affected, although in different ways. The former danced about the deck like a mad-
man, uttering the most extravagant rodomontades intermingled with howls and imprecations,
while the latter burst into tears and continued for many minutes weeping like a child.
The vessel in sight was a large hermaphrodite brig, of a Dutch build and painted black
with a tawdry gilt figurehead. She had evidently seen a good deal of rough weather and, we
supposed, had suffered much in the gale which had proven so disastrous to ourselves, for her
foretopmast was gone and some of her starboard bulwarks. When we first saw her, she was, as
I have already said, about two miles off and to windward, bearing down upon us. The breeze
was very gentle, and what astonished us chiefly was that she had no other sails set than her fore-
sail and mainsail, with a flying jib—of course she came down but slowly, and our impatience
amounted nearly to frenzy. The awkward manner in which she steered, too, was remarked by all
of us, even excited as we were. She yawed about so considerably that once or twice we thought
it impossible she could see us, or imagined that, having seen us, and discovered no person on
11
We spent the remainder of the day in a condition of stupid lethargy, gazing after the retreating
vessel until the darkness, hiding her from our sight, recalled us in some measure to our senses.
The pangs of hunger and thirst then returned, absorbing all other cares and considerations.
Nothing, however, could be done until the morning, and securing ourselves as well as possible,
we endeavored to snatch a little repose. In this I succeeded beyond my expectations, sleeping
until my companions, who had not been so fortunate, aroused me at daybreak to renew our
attempts at getting up provisions from the hull.
It was now a dead calm with the sea as smooth as I have ever known it—the weather
warm and pleasant. The brig was out of sight. We commenced our operations by wrenching
off, with some trouble, another of the forechains; and having fastened both to Peters’s feet, he
again made an endeavor to reach the door of the storeroom, thinking it possible that he might
be able to force it open, provided he could get at it in sufficient time; and this he hoped to do,
as the hulk lay much more steadily than before.
He succeeded very quickly in reaching the door, when, loosening one of the chains from
his ankle, he made every exertion to force a passage with it, but in vain, the framework of the
room being far stronger than was anticipated. He was quite exhausted with his long stay un-
derwater, and it became absolutely necessary that some other one of us should take his place.
For this service Parker immediately volunteered; but, after making three ineffectual efforts,
found that he could never even succeed in getting near the door. The condition of Augustus’s
wounded arm rendered it useless for him to attempt going down, as he would be unable to
force the room open should he reach it, and it accordingly now devolved upon me to exert
myself for our common deliverance.
Peters had left one of the chains in the passage, and I found upon plunging in that I had
not sufficient ballast to keep me firmly down. I determined, therefore, to attempt no more in
my first effort than merely to recover the other chain. In groping along the floor of the passage
for this I felt a hard substance, which I immediately grasped, not having time to ascertain what
it was but returning and ascending instantly to the surface. The prize proved to be a bottle, and
our joy may be conceived when I say that it was found to be full of port wine. Giving thanks
to God for this timely and cheering assistance, we immediately drew the cork with my penknife
and, each taking a moderate sup, felt the most indescribable comfort from the warmth, strength,
and spirits with which it inspired us. We then carefully recorked the bottle and, by means of a
handkerchief, swung it in such a manner that there was no possibility of its getting broken.
Having rested a while after this fortunate discovery, I again descended and now recovered
the chain, with which I instantly came up. I then fastened it on and went down for the third
time, when I became fully satisfied that no exertions whatever, in that situation, would enable
me to force open the door of the storeroom. I therefore returned in despair.
12
I had, for some time past, dwelt upon the prospect of our being reduced to this last horrible
extremity, and had secretly made up my mind to suffer death in any shape or under any circum-
stances rather than resort to such a course. Nor was this resolution in any degree weakened by
the present intensity of hunger under which I labored. The proposition had not been heard by
either Peters or Augustus. I therefore took Parker aside, and mentally praying to God for power
to dissuade him from the horrible purpose he entertained, I expostulated with him for a long
time and in the most supplicating manner, begging him in the name of everything which he
held sacred, and urging him by every species of argument which the extremity of the case sug-
gested, to abandon the idea and not to mention it to either of the other two.
He heard all I said without attempting to controvert any of my arguments, and I had
begun to hope that he would be prevailed upon to do as I desired. But when I had ceased
speaking, he said that he knew very well all I had said was true, and that to resort to such a
course was the most horrible alternative which could enter into the mind of man; but that he
had now held out as long as human nature could be sustained; that it was unnecessary for all
to perish, when, by the death of one, it was possible and even probable that the rest might be
finally preserved; adding that I might save myself the trouble of trying to turn him from his
purpose, his mind having been thoroughly made up on the subject even before the appearance
of the ship, and that only her heaving in sight had prevented him from mentioning his inten-
tion at an earlier period.
I now begged him, if he would not be prevailed upon to abandon his design, at least
to defer it for another day, when some vessel might come to our relief; again reiterating every
argument I could devise, and which I thought likely to have influence with one of his rough
nature. He said, in reply, that he had not spoken until the very last possible moment, that he
could exist no longer without sustenance of some kind, and that therefore in another day his
suggestion would be too late, as regarded himself at least.
Finding that he was not to be moved by anything I could say in a mild tone, I now as-
sumed a different demeanor and told him that he must be aware I had suffered less than any
of us from our calamities; that my health and strength, consequently, were at that moment far
better than his own, or than that either of Peters or Augustus; in short, that I was in a condi-
tion to have my own way by force if I found it necessary; and that, if he attempted in any
manner to acquaint the others with his bloody and cannibal designs, I would not hesitate to
throw him into the sea. Upon this he immediately seized me by the throat and, drawing a knife,
13
July 24th. This morning saw us wonderfully recruited in spirits and strength. Notwithstanding
the perilous situation in which we were still placed, ignorant of our position although certainly
at a great distance from land, without more food than would last us for a fortnight even with
great care, almost entirely without water, and floating about at the mercy of every wind and
wave on the merest wreck in the world, still the infinitely more terrible distresses and dangers
from which we had so lately and so providentially been delivered caused us to regard what we
now endured as but little more than an ordinary evil—so strictly comparative is either good
or ill.
At sunrise we were preparing to renew our attempts at getting up something from the
storeroom, when, a smart shower coming on with some lightning, we turned our attention
to the catching of water by means of the sheet we had used before for this purpose. We had
no other means of collecting the rain than by holding the sheet spread out with one of the
forechain plates in the middle of it. The water, thus conducted to the center, was drained
through into our jug. We had nearly filled it in this manner, when a heavy squall coming on
from the northward obliged us to desist, as the hulk began once more to roll so violently that
we could no longer keep our feet. We now went forward and, lashing ourselves securely to the
remnant of the windlass as before, awaited the event with far more calmness than could have
been anticipated, or would have been imagined possible under the circumstances. At noon
the wind had freshened into a two-reef breeze, and by night into a stiff gale accompanied
with a tremendously heavy swell. Experience having taught us, however, the best method
of arranging our lashings, we weathered this dreary night in tolerable security, although
thoroughly drenched at almost every instant by the sea and in momentary dread of being
washed off. Fortunately, the weather was so warm as to render the water rather grateful than
otherwise.
July 25th. This morning the gale had diminished to a mere ten-knot breeze, and the sea
had gone down with it so considerably that we were able to keep ourselves dry upon the deck.
To our great grief, however, we found that two jars of our olives, as well as the whole of our
ham, had been washed overboard, in spite of the careful manner in which they had been fas-
tened. We determined not to kill the tortoise as yet and contented ourselves, for the present,
with a breakfast on a few of the olives and a measure of water each, which latter we mixed, half
July 31st. After a night of excessive anxiety and fatigue, owing to the position of the hulk,
we set about killing and cutting up our tortoise. He proved to be much smaller than we had
supposed although in good condition—the whole meat about him not amounting to more
than ten pounds. With a view to preserving a portion of this as long as possible, we cut it into
fine pieces and filled with them our three remaining olive jars and the wine bottle (all of which
had been kept), pouring in afterward the vinegar from the olives. In this manner we put away
about three pounds of the tortoise, intending not to touch it until we had consumed the rest.
We concluded to restrict ourselves to about four ounces of the meat per day; the whole would
thus last us thirteen days. A brisk shower, with severe thunder and lightning, came on about
dusk but lasted so short a time that we only succeeded in catching about half a pint of water.
The whole of this, by common consent, was given to Augustus, who now appeared to be in the
last extremity. He drank the water from the sheet as we caught it (we holding it above him as
he lay so as to let it run into his mouth), for we had now nothing left capable of holding water,
unless we had chosen to empty out our wine from the carboy or the stale water from the jug.
Either of these expedients would have been resorted to had the shower lasted.
The sufferer seemed to derive but little benefit from the draft. His arm was completely
black from the wrist to the shoulder and his feet were like ice. We expected every moment to
see him breathe his last. He was frightfully emaciated; so much so that, although he weighed
a hundred and twenty-seven pounds upon his leaving Nantucket, he now did not weigh more
14
The Jane Guy was a fine-looking topsail schooner of a hundred and eighty tons burden. She was
unusually sharp in the bows and on a wind in moderate weather the fastest sailor I have ever
seen. Her qualities, however, as a rough-sea boat were not so good, and her draft of water was
by far too great for the trade to which she was destined. For this peculiar service a larger vessel,
and one of a light proportionate draft, is desirable—say a vessel of from three to three hun-
dred and fifty tons. She should be barque rigged and in other respects of a different construc-
*The case of the brig Polly of Boston is one so much in point, and her fate in many respects so remarkably similar
to our own, that I cannot forbear alluding to it here. This vessel, of one hundred and thirty tons burden, sailed
from Boston, with a cargo of lumber and provisions, for Santa Croix on the twelfth of December, 1811, under the
command of Captain Casneau. There were eight souls on board besides the captain—the mate, four seamen, and
the cook, together with a Mr. Hunt, and a Negro girl belonging to him. On the fifteenth, having cleared the shoal
of Georges, she sprang a leak in a gale of wind from the southeast and was finally capsized, but, the mast going
by the board, she afterward righted. They remained in this situation, without fire and with very little provisions,
for the period of one hundred and ninety-one days (from December the fifteenth to June the twentieth) when Captain
Casneau and Samuel Badger, the only survivors, were taken off the wreck by the Fame of Hull, Captain Feath-
erstone, bound home from Rio de Janeiro. When picked up they were in latitude 28 N., longitude 13 W., having
drifted above two thousand miles. On the ninth of July the Fame fell in with the brig Dromeo, Captain Perkins, who landed
the two sufferers in Kennebeck. The narrative from which we gather these details ends in the following words:
“It is natural to inquire how they could float such a vast distance, upon the most frequented part of the Atlantic, and
not be discovered all this time. They were passed by more than a dozen sail, one of which came so nigh them that they could distinctly
see the people on deck and on the rigging looking at them; but, to the inexpressible disappointment of the starving and freezing men, they stifled
the dictates of compassion, hoisted sail, and cruelly abandoned them to their fate.”
15
On the twelfth we made sail from Christmas Harbor, retracing our way to the westward and
leaving Marion Island, one of Crozet’s group, on the larboard. We afterward passed Prince
Edward’s Island, leaving it also on our left; then, steering more to the northward, made, in
fifteen days, the islands of Tristan da Cunha in latitude 37° 8' S., longitude 12° 8' W.
This group, now so well known and which consists of three circular islands, was first dis-
covered by the Portuguese and was visited afterward by the Dutch in 1643 and by the French
16
It had been Captain Guy’s original intention, after satisfying himself about the Auroras, to
proceed through the Strait of Magellan and up along the western coast of Patagonia; but
information received at Tristan da Cunha induced him to steer to the southward, in the hope
of falling in with some small islands said to lie about the parallel of 60° S., longitude 41°
20' W. In the event of his not discovering these lands, he designed, should the season prove
favorable, to push on toward the pole. Accordingly, on the twelfth of December, we made sail
in that direction. On the eighteenth we found ourselves about the station indicated by Glass
and cruised for three days in that neighborhood without finding any traces of the islands he
had mentioned. On the twenty-first, the weather being unusually pleasant, we again made sail
to the southward with the resolution of penetrating in that course as far as possible. Before
*Among the vessels which at various times have professed to meet with the Auroras may be mentioned the ship San
Miguel in 1769, the ship Aurora in 1774, the brig Pearl in 1779, and the ship Dolores in 1790. They all agree in giving
the mean latitude fifty-three degrees south.
17
We kept our course southwardly for four days, after giving up the search for Glass’s islands,
without meeting with any ice at all. On the twenty-sixth, at noon, we were in latitude 63°
23' S., longitude 41° 25' W. We now saw several large ice islands and a floe of field ice, not,
however, of any great extent. The winds generally blew from the southeast, or the northeast,
but were very light. Whenever we had a westerly wind, which was seldom, it was invariably
attended with a rain squall. Every day we had more or less snow. The thermometer, on the
twenty-seventh, stood at thirty-five.
January 1, 1828. This day we found ourselves completely hemmed in by the ice, and our
prospects looked cheerless indeed. A strong gale blew, during the whole forenoon, from the
northeast and drove large cakes of the drift against the rudder and counter with such violence
18
January 18th. This morning* we continued to the southward with the same pleasant weather
as before. The sea was entirely smooth, the air tolerably warm and from the northeast, the
*The terms morning and evening, which I have made use of to avoid confusion in my narrative as far as possible,
must not, of course, be taken in their ordinary sense. For a long time past we had had no night at all, the daylight
being continual. The dates throughout are according to nautical time, and the bearings must be understood as per
compass. I would also remark in this place that I cannot, in the first portion of what is here written, pretend to
strict accuracy in respect to dates or latitudes and longitudes, having kept no regular journal until after the period
of which this first portion treats. In many instances I have relied altogether upon memory.
19
We were nearly three hours in reaching the village, it being more than nine miles in the interior
and the path lying through a rugged country. As we passed along, the party of Too-wit (the
whole hundred and ten savages of the canoes) was momentarily strengthened by smaller de-
tachments of from two to six or seven, which joined us, as if by accident, at different turns of
the road. There appeared so much of system in this that I could not help feeling distrust, and
I spoke to Captain Guy of my apprehensions. It was now too late, however, to recede, and we
concluded that our best security lay in evincing a perfect confidence in the good faith of Too-
wit. We accordingly went on, keeping a wary eye upon the maneuvers of the savages and not
permitting them to divide our numbers by pushing in between. In this way, passing through a
precipitous ravine, we at length reached what we were told was the only collection of habita-
tions upon the island. As we came in sight of them, the chief set up a shout and frequently
20
The chief was as good as his word, and we were soon plentifully supplied with fresh provisions.
We found the tortoises as fine as we had ever seen, and the ducks surpassed our best species of
wild fowl, being exceedingly tender, juicy, and well flavored. Besides these, the savages brought
us, upon our making them comprehend our wishes, a vast quantity of brown celery and scurvy
grass, with a canoe load of fresh fish and some dried. The celery was a treat indeed, and the
scurvy grass proved of incalculable benefit in restoring those of our men who had shown
symptoms of disease. In a very short time we had not a single person on the sick list. We had
also plenty of other kinds of fresh provisions, among which may be mentioned a species of
shellfish resembling the mussel in shape but with the taste of an oyster. Shrimps, too, and
21
As soon as I could collect my scattered senses, I found myself nearly suffocated and groveling
in utter darkness among a quantity of loose earth, which was also falling upon me heavily in
every direction, threatening to bury me entirely. Horribly alarmed at this idea, I struggled to
gain my feet and at last succeeded. I then remained motionless for some moments, endeavoring
to conceive what had happened to me and where I was. Presently I heard a deep groan just at
my ear and afterward the smothered voice of Peters calling to me for aid in the name of God.
I scrambled one or two paces forward, when I fell directly over the head and shoulders of my
companion, who, I soon discovered, was buried in a loose mass of earth as far as his middle and
struggling desperately to free himself from the pressure. I tore the dirt from around him with
all the energy I could command and at length succeeded in getting him out.
As soon as we sufficiently recovered from our fright and surprise to be capable of con-
versing rationally, we both came to the conclusion that the walls of the fissure in which we
had ventured had, by some convulsion of nature or probably from their own weight, caved in
overhead and that we were consequently lost forever, being thus entombed alive. For a long
*Hazelnut. FPW
**Tremor. FPW
22
Our situation, as it now appeared, was scarcely less dreadful than when we had conceived our-
selves entombed forever. We saw before us no prospect but that of being put to death by the
savages or of dragging out a miserable existence in captivity among them. We might, to be sure,
conceal ourselves for a time from their observation among the fastnesses of the hills and, as a
final resort, in the chasm from which we had just issued; but we must either perish in the long
polar winter through cold and famine, or be ultimately discovered in our efforts to obtain relief.
The whole country around us seemed to be swarming with savages, crowds of whom, we
now perceived, had come over from the islands to the southward on flat rafts, doubtless with a
view to lending their aid in the capture and plunder of the Jane.29 The vessel still lay calmly at
anchor in the bay, those on board being apparently quite unconscious of any danger awaiting
them. How we longed at that moment to be with them! Either to aid in effecting their escape
or to perish with them in attempting a defense. We saw no chance even of warning them of
their danger without bringing immediate destruction upon our own heads, with but a remote
hope of benefit to them. A pistol fired might suffice to apprise them that something wrong had
occurred; but the report could not possibly inform them that their only prospect of safety lay
in getting out of the harbor forthwith—it could not tell them that no principles of honor now
bound them to remain, that their companions were no longer among the living. Upon hear-
ing the discharge they could not be more thoroughly prepared to meet the foe, who were now
getting ready to attack, than they already were and always had been. No good, therefore, and
infinite harm would result from our firing, and, after mature deliberation we forbore.
Our next thought was to attempt to rush toward the vessel, to seize one of the four
canoes which lay at the head of the bay and endeavor to force a passage on board. But the ut-
ter impossibility of succeeding in this desperate task soon became evident. The country, as I
said before, was literally swarming with the natives, skulking among the bushes and recesses of
the hills so as not to be observed from the schooner. In our immediate vicinity especially, and
blockading the sole path by which we could hope to attain the shore at the proper point, were
stationed the whole party of the black-skin warriors, with Too-wit at their head and appar-
ently only waiting for some reinforcement to commence his onset upon the Jane. The canoes,
too, which lay at the head of the bay were manned with savages, unarmed it is true but who
undoubtedly had arms within reach. We were forced, therefore, however unwillingly, to remain
in our place of concealment, mere spectators of the conflict which presently ensued.
In about half an hour we saw some sixty or seventy rafts, or flatboats, with outriggers,
filled with savages and coming round the southern bight of the harbor. They appeared to
have no arms except short clubs and stones which lay in the bottom of the rafts. Immediately
afterward another detachment, still larger, approached in an opposite direction and with simi-
lar weapons. The four canoes, too, were now quickly filled with natives, starting up from the
bushes at the head of the bay, and put off swiftly to join the other parties. Thus, in less time
23
During the six or seven days immediately following we remained in our hiding place upon the
hill, going out only occasionally, and then with the greatest precaution, for water and filberts.
We had made a kind of penthouse on the platform, furnishing it with a bed of dry leaves and
*This day was rendered remarkable by our observing in the south several huge wreaths of the grayish vapor I have
before spoken of.
Figure 1.
This figure (see Figure 1) gives the general outlines of the chasm without the minor
cavities in the sides, of which there were several, each cavity having a corresponding protuber-
ance opposite. The bottom of the gulf was covered to the depth of three or four inches with
a powder almost impalpable, beneath which we found a continuation of the black granite. To
the right, at the lower extremity, will be noticed the appearance of a small opening; this is the
fissure alluded to above, and to examine which more minutely than before was the object of
Figure 2.
The total length of this chasm, commencing at the opening a and proceeding round the
curve b to the extremity d, is five hundred and fifty yards. At c we discovered a small aperture
similar to the one through which we had issued from the other chasm, and this was choked up
in the same manner with brambles and a quantity of the white arrowhead flints. We forced our
way through it, finding it about forty feet long, and emerged into a third chasm. This, too, was
precisely like the first, except in its longitudinal shape, which was thus. (See Figure 3)
Figure 3. Figure 5.
Figure 4.
After satisfying ourselves that these singular caverns afforded us no means of escape from
our prison, we made our way back, dejected and dispirited, to the summit of the hill. Noth-
ing worth mentioning occurred during the next twenty-four hours, except that in examining
the ground to the eastward of the third chasm, we found two triangular holes of great depth
and also with black granite sides. Into these holes we did not think it worth while to attempt
descending, as they had the appearance of mere natural wells without outlet. They were each
about twenty yards in circumference, and their shape, as well as relative position in regard to
the third chasm, is shown in Figure 5.
On the twentieth of the month, finding it altogether impossible to subsist any longer upon the
filberts, the use of which occasioned us the most excruciating torment, we resolved to make a
desperate attempt at descending the southern declivity of the hill.30 The face of the precipice
was here of the softest species of soapstone, although nearly perpendicular throughout its
whole extent (a depth of a hundred and fifty feet at the least) and in many places even over-
arching. After a long search we discovered a narrow ledge about twenty feet below the brink of
the gulf; upon this Peters contrived to leap, with what assistance I could render him by means
of our pocket handkerchiefs tied together.31 With somewhat more difficulty I also got down;
and we then saw the possibility of descending the whole way by the process in which we had
clambered up from the chasm when we had been buried by the fall of the hill—that is, by
cutting steps in the face of the soapstone with our knives. The extreme hazard of the attempt
can scarcely be conceived; but, as there was no other resource, we determined to undertake it.
Upon the ledge where we stood there grew some filbert bushes; and to one of these we
made fast an end of our rope of handkerchiefs. The other end being tied round Peters’s waist,
I lowered him down over the edge of the precipice until the handkerchiefs were stretched tight.
He now proceeded to dig a deep hole in the soapstone (as far in as eight or ten inches), slop-
ing away the rock above to the height of a foot or thereabouts, so as to allow of his driving,
with the butt of a pistol, a tolerably strong peg into the leveled surface. I then drew him up for
about four feet, when he made a hole similar to the one below, driving in a peg as before and
having thus a resting place for both feet and hands. I now unfastened the handkerchiefs from
the bush, throwing him the end which he tied to the peg in the uppermost hole, letting himself
down gently to a station about three feet lower than he had yet been, that is, to the full extent
of the handkerchiefs. Here he dug another hole and drove another peg. He then drew himself
up so as to rest his feet in the hole just cut, taking hold with his hands upon the peg in the one
above. It was now necessary to untie the handkerchiefs from the topmost peg, with the view of
fastening them to the second; and here he found that an error had been committed in cutting
the holes at so great a distance apart. However, after one or two unsuccessful and dangerous
attempts at reaching the knot (having to hold on with his left hand while he labored to undo
the fastening with his right), he at length cut the string, leaving six inches of it affixed to the
peg. Tying the handkerchiefs now to the second peg, he descended to a station below the third,
taking care not to go too far down. By these means (means which I should never have conceived
of myself, and for which we were indebted altogether to Peters’s ingenuity and resolution) my
companion finally succeeded, with the occasional aid of projections in the cliff, in reaching the
bottom without accident.
It was some time before I could summon sufficient resolution to follow him; but I did
at length attempt it. Peters had taken off his shirt before descending, and this, with my own,
formed the rope necessary for the adventure. After throwing down the musket found in the
chasm, I fastened this rope to the bushes and let myself down rapidly, striving, by the vigor of
my movements, to banish the trepidation which I could overcome in no other manner. This
*Mounds. FPW
*The marl was also black; indeed, we noticed no light-colored substances of any kind upon the island.
25
We now found ourselves in the wide and desolate Antarctic Ocean, in a latitude exceeding
eighty-four degrees, in a frail canoe, and with no provisions but the three turtles.32 The long
polar winter, too, could not be considered as far distant, and it became necessary that we
should deliberate well upon the course to be pursued. There were six or seven islands in sight
belonging to the same group and distant from each other about five or six leagues; but upon
neither of these had we any intention to venture. In coming from the northward in the Jane Guy
we had been gradually leaving behind us the severest regions of ice—this, however little it may
be in accordance with the generally received notions respecting the antarctic, was a fact experi-
ence would not permit us to deny. To attempt getting back, therefore, would be folly—espe-
cially at so late a period of the season.33 Only one course seemed to be left open for hope. We
resolved to steer boldly to the southward, where there was at least a probability of discovering
other lands and more than a probability of finding a still milder climate.
So far we had found the antarctic, like the Arctic Ocean, peculiarly free from violent
storms or immoderately rough water; but our canoe was at best of frail structure, although
large, and we set busily to work with a view to rendering her as safe as the limited means in
our possession would admit.34 The body of the boat was of no better material than bark—the
bark of a tree unknown. The ribs were of a tough osier, well adapted to the purpose for which
it was used. We had fifty feet of room35 from stem to stern, from four to six in breadth, and
in depth throughout four feet and a half—the boats thus differing vastly in shape from those
of any other inhabitants of the southern ocean with whom civilized nations are acquainted.
We never did believe them the workmanship of the ignorant islanders who owned them, and
some days after this period discovered, by questioning our captive, that they were in fact made
by the natives of a group to the southwest of the country where we found them, having fallen
accidentally into the hands of our barbarians. What we could do for the security of our boat
was very little indeed. Several wide rents were discovered near both ends, and these we contrived
to patch up with pieces of woolen jacket. With the help of the superfluous paddles, of which
there were a great many, we erected a kind of framework about the bow, so as to break the force
of any seas which might threaten to fill us in that quarter. We also set up two paddle blades
for masts, placing them opposite each other, one by each gunwale, thus saving the necessity of
a yard. To these masts we attached a sail made of our shirts—doing this with some difficulty
as here we could get no assistance from our prisoner whatever, although he had been willing
enough to labor in all the other operations. The sight of the linen seemed to affect him in a
very singular manner. He could not be prevailed upon to touch it or go near it, shuddering
when we attempted to force him and shrieking out Tekeli-li.
Having completed our arrangements in regard to the security of the canoe, we now set
sail to the south-southeast for the present, with the view of weathering the most southerly of
the group in sight. This being done, we turned the bow full to the southward. The weather
*For obvious reasons I cannot pretend to strict accuracy in these dates. They are given principally with a view to
perspicuity of narration, and as set down in my pencil memoranda.
The circumstances connected with the late sudden and distressing death of Mr. Pym are al-
ready well known to the public through the medium of the daily press. It is feared that the few
remaining chapters which were to have completed his narrative and which were retained by him,
while the above were in type, for the purpose of revision, have been irrecoverably lost through
the accident by which he perished himself. This, however, may prove not to be the case, and the
papers, if ultimately found, will be given to the public.
No means have been left untried to remedy the deficiency. The gentleman whose name is
mentioned in the preface, and who, from the statement there made, might be supposed able to
fill the vacuum, has declined the task—this for satisfactory reasons connected with the general
inaccuracy of the details afforded him, and his disbelief in the entire truth of the latter por-
tions of the narration. Peters, from whom some information might be expected, is still alive,
and a resident of Illinois, but cannot be met with at present. He may hereafter be found and
will, no doubt, afford material for a conclusion of Mr. Pym’s account.
The loss of the two or three final chapters (for there were but two or three) is the more
deeply to be regretted, as, it cannot be doubted, they contained matter relative to the pole itself,
or at least to regions in its very near proximity; and as, too, the statements of the author in
relation to these regions may shortly be verified or contradicted by means of the governmental
expedition now preparing for the southern ocean.
On one point in the narrative some remarks may be well offered; and it would afford the
writer of this appendix much pleasure if what he may here observe should have a tendency
to throw credit, in any degree, upon the very singular pages now published. We allude to the
chasms found in the island of Tsalal and to the whole of the figures upon pages 363 to 365.
Mr. Pym has given the figures of the chasms without comment and speaks decidedly of
the indentures found at the extremity of the most easterly of these chasms as having but a fanciful
resemblance to alphabetical characters and, in short, as being positively not such. This assertion
is made in a manner so simple, and sustained by a species of demonstration so conclusive (viz.,
the fitting of the projections of the fragments found among the dust into the indentures upon
the wall), that we are forced to believe the writer in earnest, and no reasonable reader should
suppose otherwise. But as the facts in relation to all the figures are most singular (especially
when taken in connection with statements made in the body of the narrative), it may be as well
to say a word or two concerning them all—this, too, the more especially as the facts in question
have, beyond doubt, escaped the attention of Mr. Poe.
Figure 1, then Figure 2, Figure 3, and Figure 5, when conjoined with one another in the
precise order which the chasms themselves presented, and when deprived of the small lateral
branches or arches (which, it will be remembered, served only as means of communication
between the main chambers, and were of totally distinct character), constitute an Ethiopian
verbal root—the root “To be shady”—whence all the inflections of shadow or
darkness.
In regard to the “left or most northwardly” of the indentures in Figure 4, it is more than
probable that the opinion of Peters was correct and that the hieroglyphical appearance was re-
“I have graven it within the hills, and my vengeance upon the dust within the rock.”
Verne on Pym
chapter 4 from
Edgar Allan Poe and His Works
To finish this study of Poe’s works, I come at last to his novel. It’s longer than his longest short
stories and has the title The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym.1 Though it may be more human than
the tales of the grotesque and arabesque, it’s just as far off the beaten path.2 It features situ-
ations that aren’t found anywhere else and are basically dramatic in nature. You be the judge.
Poe begins right off by reprinting a note from the aforesaid Arthur Gordon Pym, all go-
ing to show that his adventures aren’t the least bit imaginary, as you would tend to believe from
their being signed with Mr. Poe’s name; he makes the case for their being the real thing; without
digging too deeply into this, we’ll see if they’re even possible, let alone probable.
Pym himself is our narrator.
From his boyhood he was obsessed with going to sea, and though he had an adventure
that nearly cost him his life, it didn’t cure him of his obsession, and one day he contemplated
(unbeknownst to his family, who wouldn’t have approved) setting sail on the brig Grampus,
bound for the whale fisheries.
Augustus Barnard, one of his friends and a crew member, was to help with this scheme
by fixing up a hiding place in the hold where Arthur would stay till departure time.3 Everything
went without a hitch, and soon our hero felt the brig get under way. But after three days in
captivity, he couldn’t think straight; he got cramps in his legs; what’s more, his food went bad;
time passed. Augustus didn’t show up; the prisoner started to seriously worry.
Using an evocative vocabulary and tremendously powerful imagery, Poe depicts the pe-
culiar hallucinations, dreams, and optical illusions that the poor man experienced, his physical
On January 19 they raised land at latitude 83°; jet-black savages, “new men,” came and
headed off the schooner, which they apparently mistook for a live creature. Encouraged by the
good behavior of these natives, Captain Guy decided to pay a visit inland; and backed by a
dozen well-armed seamen, he arrived in the village of Klock-klock after a three-hour hike. Arthur
was a member of this expedition.
“At every step we took inland,” he says, “the conviction forced itself upon us that we were
in a country differing essentially from any hitherto visited by civilized men.”
In fact the trees didn’t resemble anything growing in the torrid zones, the rocks were
novel in their mass and stratification, the water presented the strangest phenomena!
Though it was as limpid as any limestone water in existence, it didn’t have the customary
appearance of limpidity, “presenting to the eye . . . every possible shade of purple, like the hues of
a changeable silk.”
The animals in the region were fundamentally different from any known animals, at least
in their appearance.
The Jane Guy’s crew and the natives coexisted amicably. A second trip inland was ar-
ranged; six men stayed aboard the schooner while the rest took to the trail. The band crept
through the narrow winding valleys, escorted by the savages. A wall of rock rose straight up to
a great height, streaked with some fissures that caught Arthur’s attention.
As he was examining one of these with Peters and somebody named Wilson:
I was suddenly aware, he says, of a concussion* resembling nothing I had ever before experienced, and
which impressed me with a vague conception . . . that the whole foundations of the solid globe were suddenly
rent asunder and that the day of universal dissolution was at hand.
They were entombed alive; after taking stock, Peters and Arthur saw that Wilson had
been crushed to death; the two unlucky men were in the heart of a hill composed of some sort
of soapstone—buried by a cataclysm, but a manufactured cataclysm; the savages had pulled the
mountain down onto the Jane Guy’s crew, all of them perishing except for Peters and Arthur.
Digging their way through the soft rock, they made it to an opening, looked out, and
found the countryside swarming with natives; the latter attacked the schooner, which fought
back with cannon blasts; but finally they overwhelmed her, set her on fire, and soon after blew
her up in a dreadful explosion that killed several thousand people.
For many days Arthur and Peters lived in the maze, eating filberts; Arthur worked up
the exact layout of this maze, which culminated in three chasms; he even provides sketches of
*Tremor. FPW
A high range of light gray vapor appeared constantly in the southern horizon, flaring
up occasionally in lofty streaks, now darting from east to west . . . and again presenting
a level and uniform summit.
A fine white powder resembling ashes—but certainly not such—fell over the canoe . . . as
the flickering died away among the vapor and the commotion subsided in the sea.
And so it went for some days; apathy and a sudden listlessness overcame the three un-
lucky souls; their hands could no longer endure the heat of the water.
I’ll now quote the entire segment that ends this amazing narrative:
March 9th. The white ashy material fell now continually around us and in vast quantities. The range
of vapor to the southward had arisen prodigiously in the horizon and began to assume more distinctness
of form. I can liken it to nothing but a limitless cataract, rolling silently into the sea from some immense
and far-distant rampart in the heavens. The gigantic curtain ranged along the whole extent of the southern
horizon. It emitted no sound.
March 21st. A sullen darkness now hovered above us—but from out the milky depths of the ocean a
luminous glare arose and stole up along the bulwarks of the boat. We were nearly overwhelmed by the white
ashy shower, which settled upon us and upon the canoe but melted into the water as it fell. The summit of the
cataract was utterly lost in the dimness and the distance. Yet we were evidently approaching it with a hideous
velocity. At intervals there were visible in it wide, yawning, but momentary rents, and from out these rents,
within which was a chaos of flitting and indistinct images, there came rushing and mighty but soundless
winds, tearing up the enkindled ocean in their course.
And that’s how the narrative breaks off. Who will ever take it up again? Somebody more
daring than I am, somebody bolder at pushing on into the realm of things impossible.
Even so, we have to believe that Arthur Gordon Pym made it back in one piece, since he
himself generated this strange publication; but he somehow died before finishing the job. Poe
seems to deeply regret this and turns down the task of filling in the gaps.
This, then, is a summary of the American storyteller’s chief works; did I go too far in
making them out as weird and uncanny? Didn’t he actually create a new form of literature, a
form coming from the sensitivity of his excessive mental processes, to use one of his words.
Setting aside the things that are beyond comprehension, what we have to wonder at in
Poe’s output are the newness of the situations, the discussion of obscure facts, the scrutiny of
man’s morbid traits, his choice of subject, his characters who always have strange personalities,
their nervous, morbid temperaments, their way of expressing themselves with peculiar exclama-
tions. And even so, in the midst of these impossible things, there’s sometimes a realism that
overwhelms the reader’s gullibility.
Now let me draw your attention to the materialist side of these tales; you never sense
any interceding by Providence; Poe doesn’t seem to accept its presence and insists on explaining
everything by physical laws, which, if need be, he even makes up; you don’t sense in him any of
the faith he should have developed by continually contemplating the supernatural. He creates
fantastic things in cold blood, if I can put it that way, and the poor fellow remains an apostle of
materialism; but I expect it’s less the fault of his temperament than the influence of America’s
strictly pragmatic industrial world; he wrote, thought, and dreamed as a U.S. citizen, a practical
man; recognizing this inclination, let’s marvel at his works.
These extraordinary tales can give you an idea of Edgar Allan Poe’s endlessly febrile life;
unfortunately it was too much for his system, and his excesses would lead him into the horrible
addiction to alcohol that he’d identified so clearly and that brought about his death.
This English rendering of Le Sphinx des glaces adheres to the paragraphing in the original French
texts and is complete down to the smallest substantive detail. I’ve used the Livre de Poche
red-cover reissue as a working edition, but since no edition seems entirely free of typos and
production slips, I’ve double-checked the LdP text against others, both electronic and print—
notably the original 1897 J. Hetzel et Cie. hardcover edition accessible at http://gallica.bnf.fr/
ark:/12148/bpt6k58069672/, and the 2005 Omnibus compilation, L’étrange histoire d’Arthur
Gordon Pym, edited by Claude Aziza. As an additional aid to resolving textual puzzles, I’ve regu-
larly consulted the full manuscript accessible at http://www.bm.nantes.fr.
Since the majority of its readers are likely to be American, I’ve targeted my transla-
tion to the U.S. public. I’ve tried to create a reader-friendly English text that’s both faithful
and communicative—faithful in mirroring the substance, effect, and apparent intent of the
original French, communicative in its overall wording, in its efforts to suggest Verne’s narra-
tive and comic styles, and in its presentation of period, cultural, and specialized detail. Where
the French refers to people, places, things, or concepts that may be obscure to a 21st-century
American, I’ve sometimes attached a footnote or inserted a quick gloss in the text proper. My
footnotes are signed FPW. All others are from the original.
As for proper names and names of historical figures, the translation favors spellings in
regular use today; it also favors modern usages for geographical designations, while coordi-
nating, however, with the usages in Poe’s novel. Americans will have no trouble with many of
Verne’s weights and measures, but when he resorts to metric figures, the translation converts
to feet, pounds, inches, and other U.S. equivalents. Similarly, centigrade readings are converted
to Fahrenheit, and where Verne gives both, I’ve moved the centigrade equivalents to these end-
notes. To insure accuracy I’ve used two conversion instruments: http://www.convertit.com/
Go/ConvertIt/Measurement/Converter.ASP, double-checked against http://www.science-
madesimple.com/conversions.html.
MS . . . Along with over a hundred other Verne manuscripts, a full MS of Le Sphinx des glaces re-
sides in the public library at Verne’s birthplace, the Bibliothèque municipale de Nantes. A com-
plete scan can be accessed at http://www.bm.nantes.fr. User registration is free. NB: reaching
Part Two in his manuscript, Verne started over with p. 1, but the scans themselves continue the on-
going pagination. Accordingly the page numbers cited in the notes below are the scan numbers.
Generally Verne’s penmanship is calm, firm, shapely, and easy to read. This particular MS
seems well along in the creative process, much of it showing at least three stages in the writing:
a pencil draft, the entirety written over in ink, then the inked words frequently lined out and
revised. Often it closely resembles the published text, but it would have led to at least two ad-
ditional production phases: typesetting by Hetzel compositors (who sign off on the MS pages
themselves), then Verne’s correcting and tweaking of the galleys.
French editions . . . No critical edition exists of Le Sphinx des glaces. As stated, a complete scan
of the 1897 Hetzel first edition can be accessed from the Bibliothèque nationale de France
at http://gallica.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/bpt6k58069672/ It features a fair number of slips and
discrepancies that later editions I’ve seen normally replicate. These items often seem to be
typesetting errors and are cited in the notes below.
Possibly their presence can be explained by the likelihood that Verne had trouble proof-
reading at this point in his life. According to his grandson (Jules-Verne, 193–4), the aging
author checked the galleys for Sphinx in January 1997 while coping with a variety of health
issues: “His violent attacks of dizziness had returned and his doctors irrigated his stomach
several times . . . he had bronchitis now in addition to his rheumatism, and he could barely drag
himself around the room.” Plus his vision grew worse and worse during those years (Butcher,
291): “To the cataract in his left eye was added one in his right.”
Baudelaire . . . Charles Baudelaire published Aventures d’Arthur Gordon Pym, his French transla-
tion of Poe’s novel, in 1858. Complete scans of both the original Lèvy edition and the 1868
Nouvelle Édition are accessible at http://books.google.com/ under Aventures d’Arthur Gordon Pym.
Not being fluent in English, Verne relied on Baudelaire’s text, and luckily it’s vastly more
faithful, literate, and responsible than many of the English translations Verne himself received
in his lifetime. But there are occasional idiosyncrasies: Baudelaire supplies titles for all twenty-
five of Poe’s chapters, though Poe himself provides only numbers; also his rendering of the
narrative’s very close has long been controversial. Where they diverge from Poe and impact
Verne’s text, these idiosyncrasies are specified in the notes below.
Baudelaire also published two studies of Poe, Edgar Poe, sa vie et ses œuvres (1856) and Notes
nouvelles sur Edgar Poe (1857). He likewise translated many of Poe’s short stories, issuing them
in collections entitled Histoires extraordinaires (1856), Nouvelles histoires extraordinaires (1857), and
Histoires grotesques et sérieuses (1865). All are found at http://books.google.com/. Verne refers to
a number of these in Sphinx, though at times his quotations are approximate—maybe another
symptom of his waning eyesight.
Hoey . . . the only prior English translation of Le Sphinx des glaces is attributed to “Mrs. Cashel
Hoey.” Cutting over a third of Verne’s original, it was published in 1898 under the title An Ant-
arctic Mystery by the British firm Sampson Low. Its text is accessible at http://jv.gilead.org.il/
pg/10339-h.htm. Including chapter titles and footnotes, it totals 79,459 words. French edi-
tions total 122,331 words. Hence Hoey’s version is heavily abridged, chopping some 36% of
Verne’s original. In addition her text is strewn with figure errors, features a number of careless
mistranslations, retitles chapters, interpolates passages, fabricates notes, and reorganizes Part
Two by shoehorning sixteen chapters into ten. Because later editions subjected Hoey’s abridge-
1. sea lions. French editions give phoques à trompe, a synonym for the elephant seals mentioned right afterward.
Verne (or his sources) may not have been aware of the redundancy.
2. our old capital of Hartford. Three times the MS names Providence as Connecticut’s capital. Good save
by the author or his editor.
3. What would I do there. “There” is identified as Baltimore in the MS though not in the published French.
4. content with their lot. At this point in the MS (pp. 4-5), three paragraphs melodramatically foreshadow
the novel’s obsessions with Pym and the polar regions. Jeorling describes himself as “a sort of Edgar Allan Poe
character,” impressionable, sensitive, and of “an imaginative temperament”—not just the opposite of Atkins but
also the opposite of his own subsequent self-description (“I have a thoroughly practical mind, down-to-earth
personality, and unimaginative nature”). Not surprisingly, Verne deleted all three paragraphs later.
5. What with, a magnifying glass? The MS indicates that the quip was inserted later, a typical instance of
Verne adding humor to pep up his descriptions and expository details.
6. 35.6° Fahrenheit in the winter and 44.6° in the summer. French editions give only centigrade figures here,
respectively 2° and 7°. The novel’s usual procedure is to give Fahrenheit readings with centigrade equivalents in
parentheses. The MS doesn’t cite any temperatures at this point: they were added later in the process.
7. if I’m quoting from our great American author. In French editions this sequence is more paraphrase than quote:
car il est sage, comme l’a dit Edgar Poe, de toujours «calculer avec l’imprévu, l’inattendu, l’inconcevable, que
les faits collatéraux, contingents, fortuits, accidentels, méritent d’obtenir une très large part, et que le hasard
doit incessamment être la matière d’un calcul rigoureux.»
Essentially the French snatches and rearranges phrases higgledy-piggledy from a passage in Poe’s “The Mys-
tery of Marie Rogêt” (1842) as translated by Charles Baudelaire. Here’s the passage with snatchings in boldface:
C’est par l’esprit, si ce n’est précisément par la lettre de ce principe, que la science moderne est parvenue
à calculer sur l’imprévu. Mais peut-être ne me comprenez-vous pas? L’histoire de la science humaine nous
montre d’une manière si continue que c’est aux faits collatéraux, fortuits, accidentels, que nous devons
nos plus nombreuses et nos plus précieuses découvertes, qu’il est devenu finalement nécessaire, dans tout aperçu
des progrès à venir, de faire une part non-seulement très-large, mais la plus large possible aux inventions
qui naîtront du hasard, et qui sont tout à fait en dehors des prévisions ordinaires. Il n’est plus philosophique
désormais de baser sur ce qui a été une vision de ce qui doit être. L’accident doit être admis comme partie
de la fondation. Nous faisons du hasard la matière d’un calcul rigoureux. Nous soumettons l’inattendu
et l’inconcevable aux formules mathématiques des écoles.
It is through the spirit of this principle, if not precisely through its letter, that modern science has resolved to
calculate upon the unforeseen. But perhaps you do not comprehend me. The history of human knowledge
Il est sage de toujours “calculer avec l’imprévu,” l’inattendu, l’inconcevable. Cet-ci qu’il n’a pas été reconnu
par Edgard Poe qui les faits collatéraux, contingents, fortuits, accidentels, méritent d’obtenir une part “non-
seulement très large, mais la plus large possible [”], qu’il convient de l’accorder à “tout ce qui est en dehors
des prévisions ordinaires,” et que “le hasard doit incessamment être la matière d’un calcul rigoureux.”
8. letting out its shrill call. Here the MS features an additional bit of in-your-face foreshadowing, also deleted
later: Jeorling fancies the albatross is calling “Pym! Pym!”
1. Birkenhead. Baltimore in the MS, though Captain Guy still hails from Liverpool. Two MS pages later
the shipyards are properly relocated to Birkenhead.
2. August 7. For some reason Hoey says August 27.
1. “dreamed that I was dreaming.” Apparently a reference to Poe’s poem “A Dream Within a Dream” (1849).
2. the South Pole. Here Hoey interpolates the following, not found in French editions or the MS: “I might
have spoken of the ‘Hyperborean seas’ from whence an Irish poet has made Sebastian Cabot address some lovely
verses to his Lady.” Hoey then fabricates a footnote identifying the poet as Thomas D’Arcy McGee, and—still
more oddly—signs this footnote J.V.
3. Vincennes. French editions give Vancouver, apparently a typesetting error since the MS properly says
Vincennes. So do all later references in the French editions—see chapter 8 and the final chapter.
4. August 15. The MS gives August 13.
1. nine miles per hour. The MS paragraph that follows is cut in the published text. Featuring still another
piece of clunky foreshadowing, it announces that an “amazing incident” will mark the crossing to Tristan da
Cunha. As usual the final version reduces the number of “arrows” and tells the story straightforwardly.
2. a bottle with a letter. Verne added this whole passage in the right margin of the MS. By harking back to
this throwaway episode in Poe’s novel, he strengthens Len Guy’s case, raises doubts about the captain’s presumed
insanity, and finds new opportunities in the earlier storyline.
3. two lines of ellipses. Found in early editions of Baudelaire’s translation but not in Poe’s original.
1. The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. French editions cite the title of Baudelaire’s translation: Aventures
d’Arthur Gordon Pym.
2. clawed by a lion. Here Hoey fabricates another footnote (on the topic of big cats) and again attributes
it to J.V.
1. a seaman has no need for casters on his hull. Not in the MS. As noted, Verne often added jokes later to
liven things up.
2. the white giant. A detail in Baudelaire’s translation of Pym that doesn’t appear in Poe’s original. For the
novel’s last chapter, Baudelaire supplies the title “The White Giant.” Poe, as stated, supplies no chapter titles at all.
3. quite far off. A hundred miles, according to the MS.
4. the same man who had gone with the Jane’s captain when . . . he’d buried that bottle in Kerguelen’s Land. Chapter
14 of Pym disagrees, relating that Patterson “took the boats and . . . went in search of seal.” Meanwhile the
bottle was planted by “the captain and a young relation of his.”
1. Tales of the Grotesque and Arabesque. Baudelaire published his translations of a baker’s dozen under the
title Histoires extraordinaires, the title given in French editions of Sphinx.
2. Powell scouted out the South Orkney Islands. The MS and French editions say “Botwell,” whoever that may
be. However the MS correctly attributes the Orkneys to British sealer George Powell in chapter 11.
3. the schooner Wasp. “Wash” in French editions. Verne’s handwriting is smeary at this point in the MS.
4. the air temperature 47° Fahrenheit, and that of the water 44°. French editions give centigrade equivalents in
parentheses: respectively 8° 33 C. above zero and 6° 67 C. above zero.
5. the Tula and the Lively. “Tuba” in French editions and the MS. Ditto at the start of chapter 10.
6. I thought about it constantly. Jeorling records many additional thoughts on pp. 91–2 of the MS, but
most were deleted later, leaving only a single paragraph behind. In the axed passages, Jeorling alludes to his
“imaginative temperament” as he did in a section of chapter 1 (also deleted), then launches into a swirl of
soul-searching that takes in Poe’s “Eureka” (1848), dreams vs. reality, fraternal love, antarctic challenges, whether
or not he should jump ship, and the unending mysteries of Pym’s endless ending. In the published text Jeorling
often hides his feelings from the reader.
7. my brother and six of his companions. French editions say five companions, a miscount because Patterson
didn’t die till years later. The MS gives six, and the translation follows it.
1. the date of October 16. French editions and the MS give the 16th. Hoey gives the 15th for reasons
unknown.
2. the charm of charms.” French editions give a loose quote of lines in Baudelaire’s translation of “The
Domain of Arnheim” (1847).
3. the mallets sang out. Humorous musical metaphors often turn up in Verne’s yarns. For instance he char-
acterizes the squabbling trio of geographers in The Mighty Orinoco as “a trio whose performers rarely played in
tune with each other.” In fact Verne had solid musical talent (Butcher, 113): “A good pianist, he on occasion
composed music and would display great musical passion throughout his life.”
4. After he’d finished working on the hull. Hoey omits Verne’s entire description of this work, even though it’s
the focus of the chapter title.
5. nineteen recruits in all. Hoey says nine.
6. St. Nicholas Bay. French editions and the MS call it la baie des Français—the old name for la baie Saint-
Nicolas, according to Verne himself in Part I, chapter 9 of Captain Grant’s Children. However neither seems to
show up on today’s maps.
1. Weddell’s Jane. French editions and the MS have an absent-minded flip-flop: “Biscoe’s Jane.”
2. Mr. Jeorling . . . couldn’t have known of these highly significant geographic events. Nor could he have known of the
“other attempts” Verne goes on to list in this footnote—which aren’t in the MS but were added later. While
contributing to the reader’s education, the author undercuts his own narrator.
3. Coming back out? . . . Keep going! One paragraph in the MS, two in the published French. The transla-
”
1. rising sun. Both the MS and the published French give “setting sun.” But Cape Dundas points east.
2. the Englishman Powell. The MS correctly attributes the South Orkneys to British sealer George Powell.
But French editions revert to the mysterious “Botwell” cited in chapter 8.
3. Mt. Moberly. In French editions mont Stowerby. The MS is barely legible here, with Verne maybe doing
some misspelling of his own.
4. “hawk eyes flashing.” An image in Poe’s tale “The Man of the Crowd” (1840).
5. American by nationality. Hearne is called American again at the end of the chapter, but back in chapter
9 both the MS and French editions say otherwise: “these recruits included six men hailing from England, and
they in turn included a certain fellow named Hearne from Glasgow.” There doesn’t seem to be any easy way
to resolve the discrepancy.
1. that land of desolation and silence. French editions enclose the phrase in quotes: «cette contrée de la Désolation et
du Silence». The MS has no quotes here, and since the phrase doesn’t seem to be one of Baudelaire’s renderings,
the translation follows the MS.
2. the 70th parallel. Hoey revises this to “the sixty-sixth parallel,” maybe forgetting it was the punch line
for the previous chapter.
3. under the action of the swell. This clarifying prepositional phrase is found in the MS but not in the published
French. The translation follows the MS.
4. Our thermometer didn’t get above 36° Farenheit and the barometer barely topped 26.7 inches. French editions give
centigrade and metric equivalents in parentheses: respectively 2° 22 C. above zero and 721 millimeters.
1. these frozen masses didn’t originate at the ice barrier. Hoey says the opposite.
2. The breeze picked up at times and we needed to take in sail. Some French editions end the sentence with a
question mark, but the MS uses a period. The translation follows the MS.
3. 74th parallel. For some unfathomable reason French editions give the 23rd parallel, which is gibberish
since it puts the Jane level with Rio de Janeiro. The MS gives the 74th, obviously correct.
4. 42° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 4° to 5° C. above zero.
5. 36° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 2° 22 C. above zero.
6. 49° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 9° 44 C. above zero.
1. northwest to southeast. Both the MS and the published French give “northwest to northeast,” a slip repeat-
edly contradicted in chapter 13.
2. latitude 73° 15'. Hoey gives 23° 15'. (But the Wildside Press edition of this early text omits the
coordinate altogether.)
3. Though she’d had an air temperature of 33° Fahrenheit, ours had risen to 49°. French editions give centigrade
equivalents in parentheses: respectively 0° 56 C. above zero and 9° 44 C. above zero.
4. some dolphinfish. Here Hoey fabricates another footnote (on the etymology of a colloquial name for this
fish). At least the note isn’t attributed to J.V.
5. wasn’t locked. Hoey says the opposite.
6. circumstances whose details nobody knew. Then the MS expands on chapter 10’s curtain line, speculating
that Pym was still “deep in these polar regions, beyond Tsalal Island,” and needed to be rescued as well. Verne
deleted these ruminations as he did many other bits of foreshadowing in the MS.
7. daily gazette. Not in the MS. Another joke added later in the process.
8. The temperature was 34° Fahrenheit and soon got up to 51°. French editions give centigrade equivalents in
parentheses: respectively 1° 11 C. above zero and 10° 56 C. above zero.
9. longitude 42°. French editions give 42° 5', but Poe’s original and Baudelaire’s rendering give just 42°
minus the extra five minutes. The MS has a longish vertical squiggle at this point: though it vaguely resembles
Verne’s other 5s, it might also be a slip of the pen. So the translation follows Poe and Baudelaire.
1. nearly thirty-five miles off. French editions specify “thirty nautical miles.” The MS gives “about eighty
miles.”
2. thirty-five-mile crossing. Again the MS gives eighty miles.
3. latitude 83° 2'. The MS gives 82° 57', putting the Halbrane 20+ miles away.
1. they viewed her as an enormous animal. Poe’s narrative suggests that this behavior was sham. As Pym com-
ments in chapter 18, “I could not help thinking some of it affected.”
2. Anas valisneria. Poe’s original doesn’t specify the bird’s scientific name. Baudelaire’s translation inserts
a gloss for Gallic readers: canvass-back ou anas valisneria de notre pays. Not being fluent in English, Verne follows
Baudelaire.
3. Mt. Erebus and Mt. Terror. As Hoey translates this, it reads “we might find the Erebus and the Terror,”
which confuses the two volcanoes with Sir James Clark Ross’s famous ships bearing the same names.
4. Tiger . . . met his death in the catastrophe. The MS immediately takes exception to this reading of events,
wondering why Pym and Peters didn’t bring the dog along when they left the island prior to the quake. Verne
deleted the paragraph later, having other plans for Tiger near the end of the novel.
5. gigantic black birds in space. An odd discrepancy because Poe, Baudelaire, and Verne elsewhere (chapter 5)
respectively describe these birds as “pallidly white,” or blanc livide, or d’une blancheur livide. Verne may have mixed
them up with the sooty albatrosses figuring much more recently in chapters 11 and 14.
6. last look at Tsalal Island. This line replaces a paragraph of speculative foreshadowing in the MS: Would
the Halbrane push on to the pole itself ? Would her crew go along with this change in plans? Verne subsequently
transferred this material to the next chapter, using it to launch Part Two.
1. Part Two: Chapter numbering. French editions start over again with chapter 1.
2. eleven times now. Hoey gives “seven times” . . . and no explanation.
3. the half-breed didn’t find a single native. But the MS adds that Peters then found the Newfoundland dog
Tiger, alive, rabid, and menacing. Subsequently Verne relocated all descriptions of Tiger’s fate to a chapter near
the end, where they figure in clearing up the mystery of what happened to the Tsalal islanders.
4. All crewmen aft! Hoey sends them in the opposite direction.
1. I wasn’t the practical, logical fellow I used to be. Not in the MS but added later. Since Verne has pruned
Jeorling’s “oversensitivity” from the finished versions of his earlier chapters, he can now show his character
evolving by developing this trait.
2. I’m Dirk Peters. French editions enclose this in quotes, the MS doesn’t. The translation follows the MS.
3. No, that isn’t so. But it is so. In chapter 9 Jeorling tells us that the Falkland recruits “weren’t to be
taken beyond Tsalal Island.”
1. As for Peters . . . might someday be revealed to us. The whole paragraph was inserted after the MS stage. A
second instance of foreshadowing added rather than subtracted.
1. chapter 25 of Pym’s narrative. Chapter 24 in Poe’s original, the result of a numbering mystification (two
consecutive chapter 23s) that some current editions still retain. Baudelaire’s translation renumbers the last two
chapters, as The Edgar Allan Poe Society of Baltimore also suggests these days.
2. 43° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 6° 11 C. above zero.
3. 50° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 10° above zero.
4. for two days now . . . leaving Tsalal Island. Hoey gives “four days” and “leaving the Falklands.”
1. 48° Fahrenheit and . . . 33° Fahrenheit. French editions give centigrade equivalents in parentheses: respec-
tively 8° 89 C. above zero and 0° 56 C. above zero.
2. $400 each man gets. French editions add “for each degree”—not true because this is the bonus earned
for six degrees, as Hurliguerly has just pointed out.
3. even if he performs only the duties of bosun on board. Oddly, French editions give “bosun on board the Jane,”
which Hoey understandably corrects to “on board the Halbrane.” However the MS doesn’t give any ship name
at all, and the translation follows suit.
4. less than 140 miles. French editions give “less than 120 nautical miles.”
5. orders to change direction. The MS hatches a new plot complication here: Jeorling is on the outs with
the captain and first officer, who avoid him on deck and snub him at mealtimes—the implication being that
Jeorling and his bonus are causing headaches. Verne soon dropped the idea.
6. he wouldn’t drag his feet in issuing those orders. Hoey says the opposite.
7. Ned Holt. James Holt in the MS, here and later on. Verne may have changed it because of West’s first
name, Jem.
1. 84th parallel. Clearly an allusion to chapter 18 where Jeorling offered a $2,000 bonus “for every degree
beyond the 84th parallel.” Yet both the MS and the published French get it wrong: the former gives the 88th
parallel, the latter gives the 24th—possibly a fumbled correction. Verne’s vision problems may have interfered
with his decently proofing the galleys, and apparently his publisher didn’t always take up the slack.
2. port davits. Per the MS. French editions mistakenly put them to starboard.
3. fifteen men, versus thirteen of us. Hoey gives fourteen and twelve, a case of faulty arithmetic. The party of
the faithful numbered fourteen, including Peters; Drap was lost during the iceberg somersault, leaving thirteen.
For correct figures on the rebel alliance, see the note following.
4. fourteen other Falkland sailors. This time Hoey reduces the figure to thirteen, additional faulty arithmetic.
Exactly twenty sailors were hired in the Falklands; Peters defected to the other side, leaving nineteen; four were
lost during the iceberg somersault, leaving fifteen—Hearne and “fourteen other Falkland sailors.”
1. 46° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 7° 78' C. above zero. Hoey
has another wrong number at this spot: 2° 78' C.
2. a foolhardy move for any mariner. In the MS at this point Jeorling, rabid about reaching the pole, contem-
plates other foolhardy moves: drifting to it on an iceberg, rowing there in the longboat, even swimming to the
spot . . . understandably, Verne redid the passage. In general his later revisions de-emphasize the pole seeking.
3. two or three of his men. For some reason Hoey gives “one or two.” The actual total according to Poe’s
original (and Verne’s summary in chapter 5) was four.
4. 53° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 11° 67' C. above zero.
Hoey is wrong again, giving 11° 67' C. below zero. (But the Wildside Press edition of this early text omits the
conversion altogether.)
1. As for First Officer West . . . yes, he wept. This humanizing paragraph was added after the MS stage.
2. Peters wouldn’t let anybody relieve him. In the MS Jeorling wonders if it’s wise to trust the half-breed
with the dinghy. Obsessed with finding Pym, might he not make off with the longboat himself . . . and want
Jeorling to come along?
1. whether the current went right to the pole. The MS (p. 308) predicts the iceberg will pass ten or fifteen miles
to one side of the pole. Verne reworked the passage to minimize the pole as a concern.
2. 400 miles away. Hoey gives four thousand miles.
3. the current had tossed us about twenty-four degrees back into the southeast. Compare the present reading of Lon-
gitude 67° 19' west with the captain’s previous one of Longitude 39° 12' west (end of chapter 23). French
editions and the MS give these figures unambiguously, yet Jeorling’s conclusion doesn’t follow at all: based on
these coordinates, the current had actually taken them twenty-eight degrees into the southwest. As commentators have
noted, Verne sometimes flip-flops his directions, but since both figures clearly say west, and since we’re repeat-
edly told the current flows southeast, there’s no quick fix for this blooper.
1. Fogbound. The MS features a different chapter title: Un Dernier Coup (“The Last Straw”).
2. nearly 1,400 miles. French editions give 1,200 nautical miles.
3. 30.2 inches. French editions give the metric equivalent in parentheses: 767 millimeters.
1. this strait cuts the polar continent in half. The MS describes this fictitious channel as forty or fifty miles
across. Incidentally, some paleontologists believe a transantarctic strait did exist for much of the Tertiary Period.
2. 46°. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 7° 78 C. above zero.
3. as quickly as possible. At this point in the MS, Jeorling bids farewell to any dreams of reaching the South
Pole: he notes that the spot is now 240 miles in the wrong direction and that nobody besides Peters would
be deranged enough to go with him. Verne deleted the passage in line with his later policy of downplaying
the pole as a major issue in the novel.
1. Dirk Peters Goes to Sea. The MS features a different chapter title: “Thirteen for Chapter Thirteen.” (In
French editions chapter 13 of Part Two is equivalent to this translation’s chapter 29.) It seems odd to name
a chapter after characters—the thirteen fleeing Falklanders—who no longer play an active role. Also the titles
for chapter 30 and chapter 32 feature a similar sort of wordplay. No doubt these are among the reasons why
Verne retitled this chapter.
2. I thought Peters could have been talking in his sleep, and the master sealer must have found out his secret by chance. Hoey
mangles this, saying Hearne was the one talking in his sleep, Holt the one who must have overheard.
3. dropped to 36°. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 2° 22' C. above zero.
4. 32° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 0° C.
1. blackfish. French editions give des antoys, seriously faulty typesetting. The MS gives des tautogs, which are
popularly known in English as blackfish or black porgies.
Chapter 31. THE SPHINX OF THE ICE REALM (MS pp. 367–382)
1. The Sphinx of the Ice Realm. The MS chapter title is “The Antarctic Sphinx.”
2. The craft we rode in belonged to the latter category. Hoey says just the opposite: “Our boat was of the former kind.”
a) IT WOULDN’T HAVE MUCH REACH. Initially Kues is intrigued by the novel’s inventiveness:
“Electric currents do generate a magnetic field,” he states, “but need to be concentrated, as in a
wire. Presumably Verne’s ‘seam of metal winding through the earth with countless twists and turns’
is meant to simulate a gigantic electric wire.” Unfortunately, Kues notes, it would have little reach:
“Away from their source, electromagnetic fields dwindle rapidly. Both the atmosphere and the rocks
around Verne’s ‘seam of metal’ are excellent insulators and would constrain any large-scale build-up
of magnetism. I think this would make it impossible for the iron sphinx to produce a magnetic
field enormous enough to rip the metal nails out of boats or send iron implements flying through
the air.” And in simultaneous emails to FPW , a prominent colleague echoes this: Dr. John Geiss-
man, professor of Geosciences at the University of Texas at Dallas, agrees that “field effects of a
magnetized body drop off very quickly with distance.”
b) IT’S IMPOSSIBLY BIG. “From a geologic perspective,” Geissman also writes, “I’m not aware of
any ‘lodestone’ so monstrous in size. In principle, if you had a sufficiently large volume of uniformly,
and I do mean uniformly, magnetized material, then maybe the magnetic components of an object, if
sufficiently close, could be affected . . . but this is a stretch.” And Kues seconds the motion: “I would
be hard-pressed to even postulate the geological conditions that might lead to such an enormous
mass of pure iron occurring isolated like a sphinx on the earth’s surface.”
c) IT DOESN’T HAVE A GOOD POWER SOURCE. “Verne visualizes clouds storing vast
amounts of electricity, which is partly drained off by thunderstorms,” Kues comments. “Actually,
electricity is developed within thunderstorms, which generate lightning bolts—but not as some sort
of draining of oversaturated clouds.” So where might any electricity come from? “There’s certainly
some available in the environment, but nothing of the magnitude to change the iron sphinx into a
lodestone.”
Yet like many scientists, both men enjoy Verne. “Like any good science-fiction writer,” Kues says, “Verne
took what was known about electricity and magnetism in his day, then extrapolated what probably seemed to
most readers like a plausible explanation for a phenomenon he invented himself.” And Geissman’s verdict? “A
good read, and I’m certain Verne thrilled his readers at the time!” he concludes.
1. Lieutenant Charles Wilkes. French editions and the MS give James as Wilkes’s first name here—odd, because
they get it right in chapter 3 and chapter 8.
2. 65° 57. Clearly given as such in the MS and Wilkes’s deepest penetration near the Sabrina Coast.
French editions flip-flop it to 56° 57, probably a typesetting error.
3. away to the northwest. French editions say northeast, a discrepancy since Halbrane Land lies off the vessel’s
port side. The MS properly gives “northwest,” so this may be yet another typesetting error.
4. 4° Fahrenheit. French editions give the centigrade equivalent in parentheses: 15° 56 C. below zero.
5. till April 2. Hoey says “until the end of April.”
6. February 21. Hoey says “the 1st of February.”
7. the English schooner Halbrane. Hoey calls her an “American schooner.”
8. Sabrina Coast. The MS clearly says Sabrina, but French editions give “Fabricia,” another typesetting
error not caught by Verne’s aging eyes—or anybody else’s back then.
First published as The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym of Nantucket by Harper & Brothers in July 1838. For
modern American readers the text makes adjustments to the original Harper edition, correcting typos, updating
punctuation and spelling, italicizing ship names, making occasional tweaks for readability, and renumbering the
final chapters. The following should be especially noted:
1. The wind, as I before said . . . otherwise for many hours. These three paragraphs are a single paragraph in
Harper.
2. without a shilling. Harper gives “with a shilling.”
3. The middle of June . . . saltwater Long Tom. These three paragraphs are a single paragraph in Harper.
4. I remained three days . . . he went up. These two paragraphs are a single paragraph in Harper.
5. the side next to me. Harper omits “to.”
6. previous to my last journey to the trap. Harper gives “previously to.”
7. the word “Arthur!” Harper doesn’t add quotes here but does so in the dialogue immediately following.
8. As I fell . . . physical luxuries afforded. These three paragraphs are a single paragraph in Harper.
9. but then. Harper gives “but when.”
10. seven feet of water. Harper omits “of.”
11. the eating of some unknown venomous species. Harper omits “of.”
12. the degree of forgetfulness being proportional. In Harper “being proportioned.”
13. Penguins are very plentiful. Harper gives “very plenty.”
14. picking them up stone by stone. Harper omits “them.”
15. the sending of a jollyboat. Harper omits “of.”
16. Whales are also plentiful. Harper gives “also plenty.”
17. Krusenstern and Lisiansky. “Kreutzenstern and Lisiausky” in Harper.
18. with a view to penetrating. Harper gives “a view of.”
19. latitude 69° 15' S. Harper gives latitude 69° 15' E.
20. previous to our passing the Antarctic Circle. Harper gives “previously to.”
21. and for taking on board a proper supply. Harper reads: “and the taking on board.”
22. three sides of the village were bounded. Harper gives “was bounded.”
First published as Edgard Poe et ses œuvres in the Musée des familles, April 1864. The following comments are
pertinent to this new translation of Chapter 4:
1. The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym. In French editions Verne’s essay cites the title of Baudelaire’s transla-
tion, Aventures d’Arthur Gordon Pym.
2. the tales of the grotesque and arabesque. In French editions Verne calls them histoires extraordinaires after the
title of Baudelaire’s first Poe collection.
3. Arthur. In this early essay Verne regularly refers to Pym by his middle name, Gordon, unlike his later
practice in The Sphinx of the Ice Realm. In Poe’s original only Pym’s grandfather calls him by his middle name;
meanwhile Augustus calls him Arthur, and Tiger’s collar reads “Tiger—Arthur Pym.” For consistency’s sake
the translation sticks with Arthur.
4. “Tiger Gone Mad!” Chapter title supplied by Baudelaire. In Poe’s original, as noted elsewhere, the
chapters are numbered but not titled.
5. the mate and the cook, Peters. An odd slip. Peters wasn’t the cook, just a member of his faction. The elderly
Verne had no trouble sorting out Poe’s mutiny, unlike his younger self.
6. a raven. A seagull in Poe’s original and Baudelaire’s translation.
7. April 6. Poe and Baudelaire both give August 7.
8. three unlucky men. By this point there were only two, Pym and Peters. According to Poe and Baudelaire,
Augustus died six days earlier.
9. October 10. Poe and Baudelaire both give the 18th.
10. a veiled human figure . . . the hue of the man’s skin was of the perfect whiteness of the snow. As noted elsewhere,
Baudelaire’s rendering is arguably a mistranslation, so I’ve adjusted the quote from Poe’s original to better
represent the text Verne knew.
Pym’s narrative ends with two crazy-making sentences: “. . . there arose in our pathway a
shrouded human figure, very far larger in its proportions than any dweller among men. And the
hue of the skin of the figure was of the perfect whiteness of the snow.”
This phantom figure was a lifelong burr under Verne’s saddle. “And that’s how the nar-
rative breaks off,” he wrote in 1864, rolling his eyes. Then, three decades later when he sum-
marized Pym’s tale all over again, he was still exasperated: “This is how it ends . . . or rather
doesn’t end.”
“Obviously,” as a latter-day biographer notes (Lottman, 299), “his imagination had been
captured by the novel’s strange and abrupt ending.”
He wasn’t the only one. When Pym first appeared, an American reviewer promptly com-
plained about its frustrating conclusion (Harvey, 36), calling it “purely perplexing and vexa-
tious.” And down through the years, according to J. Gerald Kennedy (70), these last words of
Pym’s “have provoked more critical disagreement than any other brief passage in Poe’s writ-
ings.”
To say the least. Sifting through the reams of interpretations, Richard Kopley notes (2)
that “Pym’s antarctic apparition . . . has elicited a particularly broad range of explication: it is
death, a figure triumphing over death, knowledge, the limits of knowledge, goodness, perver-
sity, the imagination, the narrative itself, the white at the bottom of the page, a Titan, a divinity,
Christ, and Pym’s unrecognized white shadow—a self-projection.”
And wait, there’s more. Scanning other commentaries, Harvey (13) finds a passel of
additional theories: “. . . it is the archetypal mother, to which he has arrived ‘through a warm
cosmic milk bath.’ . . . Pym sees a great uroboros figure, symbol of totality, eternity and recon-
ciliation of all oppositions. . . . it is the image of Pym’s own imagination, which he embraces
instead of reality, and which saves him from destruction by its ‘creative power.’ . . . it is an angel,
by whose supernatural agency Pym is saved. . . . it is an illusion, for Pym has actually moved
Then what, we can reasonably ask, is Verne after? If he’s not trying to justify or debunk or even
explain Poe, what’s he up to?
Let’s look at what his novel actually does.
Reworking some of Poe’s characters and mixing in his own, Verne develops new puzzles
and plotlines—a mass disappearance, a mysterious boneyard, a regionwide earthquake, a dou-
ble manhunt, and a climactic journey that literally crosses the bottom of the world.
The Sorbonne’s Daniel Compère (71–2) charts this trailblazing journey as a progres-
sion from the known to the unknown: it moves from true-life locales such as the Falklands
and South Georgia Island . . . to locales invented by Poe such as Bennet’s Islet and Tsalal Is-
land . . . to Verne’s own inventions such as Halbrane Land and Sphinx Country. In Part Two
of Sphinx, therefore, “we understand that we’re in a strictly Vernian universe. All references to
reality or to Edgar Allan Poe have vanished.”*
So during the second half of his book, Verne is his own man—it’s his own quest, his
own vision, his own newfangled “region of novelty and wonder.” Writing six decades after Poe,
he unveils a host of marvels not found in his forerunner’s narrative: sunken islands . . . rime
frost and hoarfrost . . . frozen drinking water . . . fleets of floating mountains . . . iceberg som-
ersaults . . . electric snowflakes . . . the southern lights . . . peasoupers so dense, they “push
back” . . . and, of course, a colossal lodestone.
Whatever it is that Verne’s after, he’s like any self-respecting artist who gets an idea from
somebody else. He’s like Shakespeare with Cinthio, or Brahms with Paganini, or Monty Python
with Thomas Mallory.
In short, he’s in it for himself.
Consequently he unfurls his wettest, grittiest sea story . . . plays out his old fascination
with polar exploration . . . exploits the latest waves of public curiosity . . . and for the ump-
Chapter 25: “. . . there arose in our pathway a shrouded human figure. And the hue of the skin of the
figure was of the perfect whiteness of the snow.”
Chapter 20: “I was suddenly aware of a concussion . . . which impressed me . . . that the whole founda-
tions of the solid globe were suddenly rent asunder and that the day of universal dissolution was at hand.”
Chapter 11: “He proposed, in a few words, that one of us should die to preserve the existence of the others.”
Chapter 8: “. . . one of the most tremendous waves I had then ever known broke right on board of
us . . . filling every inch of the vessel with water.”
As Dameron concludes (43), “several options were open to [Poe] and the final note
is not necessarily the final word.” And this jibes with what’s known of Pym’s compositional
process: as described in the Foreword to this volume, Pym went through several developmental
phases, the last one—the episode of the hieroglyphic chasms and the final note—being “a very
late interpolation” (Harvey, 107).
VERNE AS EXORCIST
As often as not, both Verne and Poe are rationalists. But Vernians can sometimes overdo the
distinctions between the Frenchman and the American, seeing Poe’s fiction as dominated by
horror and magic, or composed (Jules-Verne, 63) “of one ‘miraculous’ event after another.”
No question about the horror, but relatively few of Poe’s tales actually feature magic, the
miraculous, or the supernatural. True, “M.S. Found in a Bottle” and “The Masque of the Red
Death” (1842) turn out to be ghost stories, but they’re comparative rarities in Poe’s output.
His crime narratives may deal with fatal obsessions, death wishes, and guilty consciences, but
there’s nothing magical about their tell-tale hearts, black cats, casks of amontillado, or imps of
the perverse. Nor is there anything supernatural in the buried-alive stories, or the five detec-
tive yarns, or suspense thrillers such as “The Pit and the Pendulum” (1842), or psychological
parables such as “William Wilson.” Verne himself called Poe “an apostle of materialism” in
his 1864 essay: “you never sense any interceding by Providence; Poe doesn’t seem to accept its
presence and insists on explaining everything by physical laws.”
And despite what some have said, Verne isn’t much different. His early biographers laid
stress on his Roman Catholicism—his grandson (Jules-Verne, 63) called him “deistic to the
core, thanks to his upbringing”—yet his novels rarely have any spiritual content other than a
few token appeals to the almighty. (“Thanks to Providence came to our lips,” Jeorling blandly
remarks in Sphinx.) In fact such conventional nods were house policy at J. Hetzel et Cie: the
publisher himself, Lottmann says (135), “was the one who usually added the pious touches to
Verne’s stories.”
Like Poe, Verne turned out a few atypical yarns with occult components, “Master Zacha-
rias” (1854) or The Secret of Wilhelm Storitz (1910). Otherwise the Frenchman goes even farther
as a rational clarifier. Though Sphinx doesn’t set out to clear up the oddities in Pym (other than
suggesting they’re figments), in other novels Verne exorcises quite a few ghosts. Again and again
his yarns begin with uncanny phenomena that later are sorted out with the help of science and
technology—20,000 Leagues, for instance, or The Underground City (1877), Robur the Conquerer
(1886), Master of the World (1904), and especially The Castle in Transylvania (1892). Even Verne’s
straight thrillers are hard-headed and empirical: his little-known detective novels feature now-
classic plots that are “both amusing and amazing” (Walter, 7)—a jewel heist in The Southern Star
(1884), an unbreakable code in The Giant Raft (1881), a death-row rescue in The Kip Brothers,
even a locked-room mystery in A Drama in Livonia (1904). Verne, like Poe, had the makings of
a major-league materialist.
Aziza, Claude, ed. 2005. L’étrange histoire d’Arthur Gordon Pym. Paris: Omnibus.
Handy compilation of Baudelaire’s translation, Verne’s sequel, and critical essays by both men.
Butcher, William. 2006. Jules Verne: The definitive biography. New York: Thunder’s Mouth.
Bio by a ranking Verne scholar, full of new detail on Verne’s private life.
Compère, Daniel. 1977. Approche de l’île chez Jules Verne. Paris: Lettres modernes Minard.
Forms and functions of islands in Verne, including the iceberg in Sphinx Pt. II.
Dameron, J. Lasley. 1992. “Pym’s polar episode: Conclusion or beginning?” In Poe’s Pym: Critical
explorations, ed. Richard Kopley. Durham: Duke.
Presents natural explanations for the phenomena in Pym’s later chapters.
Davies, Thomas D. 1989. Robert E. Peary at the North Pole. Rockville, MD: Navigation Foundation.
Finds that Peary’s hard evidence supports his claim to have reached the pole.
Evans, Arthur B. 2005. Jules Verne’s English translations. Science Fiction Studies 32 (March), 80-
104.
The editor of Science Fiction Studies lists, describes, and assesses English versions of Verne’s works.
Evans, I. O. 1960. Editorial postscript. In The mystery of Arthur Gordon Pym by Edgar Allan Poe
and Jules Verne. London: Arco.
Gallimaufry that condenses and conflates the two novels; Evans provides closing remarks.
Harvey, Ronald C. 1998. The critical history of Edgar Allan Poe’s The Narrative of Arthur Gordon
Pym. New York: Garland.
Surveys Pym’s contentious reception from publication to the present.
Huet, Marie-Hélène. 1979. “Itinéraire du texte.” In Colloque de Cerisy: Jules Verne et les sciences hu-
maines. Paris: Union Générale.
Argues that Sphinx doesn’t clarify Pym but purges or disproves it.
Huntford, Roland. 1986. The last place on earth. New York: Atheneum.
Analyzes Amundsen’s victory over Scott in their race to the South Pole.
Jules-Verne, Jean. 1976. Jules Verne: A biography. Translated and adapted by Roger Greaves. New
York: Taplinger.
Indispensable biography by Verne’s grandson.
Kennedy, J. Gerald. 1995. The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym and the abyss of interpretation.
New York: Twayne.
Concludes that the novel’s ambivalence is built in and must be accepted.
Kopley, Richard, ed. 1992. Poe’s Pym: Critical explorations. Durham: Duke.
Showcases the amazing range of contemporary takes on this novel.
Lottman, Herbert R. 1996. Jules Verne: An exploratory biography. New York: St. Martins.
Bio targeted to the general public, controversial but closely researched.
Meakin, David. 1993. “Like poles attracting: Intertextual magnetism in Poe, Verne, and Gracq.”
Modern Language Review, 88 (July), 600–611.
Believes Verne undertook a “corrective rewriting” of Pym.
Poe, Edgar Allan. 1994. The imaginary voyages, ed. by Burton R. Pollin. New York: Gordian
Press.
Critical edition of Pym, Hans Pfaall, and the fragment Julius Rodman.
Silverman, Kenneth. 1991. Edgar A. Poe: Mournful and never-ending remembrance. New York: Harper.
Interpretative bio, scrutinizes themes of illusion and disorder in Pym.
Walter, Frederick Paul. 2003. “Verne, Doyle, and vanishing diamonds.” Extraordinary Voyages 9
(June), 6–7.
Examines Verne’s ingeniously plotted detective fiction.
Adventures of Captain Hatteras, The. 2005. Translated by William Butcher. New York: Oxford.
Conquest of the North Pole four decades before Peary.
Amazing journeys: Five visionary classics. 2010. Translated by Frederick Paul Walter. Albany: State
University of New York.
New translations of old favorites: Journey to the Center of the Earth, From the Earth to the Moon, Circling the
Moon, 20,000 Leagues Under the Seas, and Around the World in 80 Days.
Begum’s millions, The. 2005. Translated by Stanford L. Luce. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan.
Grimly prophetic tale of German armament building and military aggression.
Invasion of the sea. 2001. Translated by Edward Baxter. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan.
Techno thriller about creating an inland sea in the Sahara.
Kip brothers, The. 2007. Translated by Stanford L. Luce. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan.
Scientific crime thriller about murder in the South Seas.
Lighthouse at the end of the world. 2007. Translated by William Butcher. Lincoln: U. of Nebraska.
Duel to the death on the lowermost crags of South America.
Meteor hunt, The. 2006. Translated by Frederick Paul Walter and Walter James Miller. Lincoln:
U. of Nebraska.
Comic sf novel in which U.S. astronomers feud over a shooting star.
Mighty Orinoco, The. 2002. Translated by Stanford L. Luce. Middletown, CT: Wesleyan.
Jungle adventure thriller about searching for the Orinoco’s headwaters.
Mysterious island, The. 2001. Translated by Jordan Stump. New York: Modern Library.
Masterful desert-island yarn complete with do-it-yourself science.
Paris in the twentieth century. 1996. Translated by Richard Howard. New York: Random.
“Long lost” character novel featuring future developments in the City of Light.
Secret of Wilhelm Storitz, The. 2011. Translated by Peter Schulman. Lincoln: U. of Nebraska.
One-of-a-kind urban fantasy that juggles science and horror.
ELECTRONIC RESOURCES
413
Illustrations for The Sphinx of the Ice Realm by George Roux from the Le Sphinx des glaces, published
by J. Hetzel et Cie, 1897. Illustrations for chapter 1 and chapter 25 of The Narrative of Arthur
Gordon Pym by A. D. McCormick from Arthur Gordon Pym: A Romance, published by Downey &
Co., 1898; illustration for chapter 13 by Albert Sterner from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe: Tales of
Adventure and Exploration, published by Stone & Kemble, 1895. Sphinx frontispiece: Verne photo-
graphed c. 1878. Pym frontispiece: Poe photographed in 1848.