Jules Verne For Children: 16 Incredible Tales of Mystery, Courage & Adventure (Illustrated Edition). Jules Verne
while the worthy SAVANT took time to collect his thoughts before complying with his lordship’s request. Then putting his finger on the words, and emphasizing some of them, he began as follows:
”’Le 7 juin 1862 le trois-mats Britannia de Glasgow a sombre apres,’— put, if you please, ‘deux jours, trois jours,’ or ‘une longue agonie,’ it doesn’t signify, it is quite a matter of indifference,—’sur les cotes de l’Australie. Se dirigeant a terre, deux matelots et le Capitaine Grant vont essayer d’aborder,’ or ‘ont aborde le continent ou ils seront,’ or, ‘sont prisonniers de cruels indigenes. Ils ont jete ce documents,’ etc. Is that clear?”
“Clear enough,” replied Glenarvan, “if the word continent can be applied to Australia, which is only an island.”
“Make yourself easy about that, my dear Glenarvan; the best geographers have agreed to call the island the Australian Continent.”
V. IV Verne
“Then all I have now to say is, my friends,” said Glenarvan, “away to Australia, and may Heaven help us!”
“To Australia!” echoed his companions, with one voice.
“I tell you what, Paganel,” added Glenarvan, “your being on board the DUNCAN is a perfect providence.”
“All right. Look on me as a messenger of providence, and let us drop the subject.”
So the conversation ended—a conversation which great results were to follow; it completely changed the moral condition of the travelers; it gave the clew of the labyrinth in which they had thought themselves hopelessly entangled, and, amid their ruined projects, inspired them with fresh hope. They could now quit the American Continent without the least hesitation, and already their thoughts had flown to the Australias. In going on board the DUNCAN again they would not bring despair with them, and Lady Helena and Mary Grant would not have to mourn the irrevocable loss of Captain Grant. This thought so filled them with joy that they forgot all the dangers of their actual situation, and only regretted that they could not start immediately.
It was about four o’clock in the afternoon, and they determined to have supper at six. Paganel wished to get up a splendid spread in honor of the occasion, but as the materials were very scanty, he proposed to Robert to go and hunt in the neighboring forest. Robert clapped his hands at the idea, so they took Thalcave’s powder flask, cleaned the revolvers and loaded them with small shot, and set off.
“Don’t go too far,” said the Major, gravely, to the two hunters.
After their departure, Glenarvan and McNabbs went down to examine the state of the water by looking at the notches they had made on the tree, and Wilson and Mulrady replenished the fire.
No sign of decrease appeared on the surface of the immense lake, yet the flood seemed to have reached its maximum height; but the violence with which it rushed from the south to north proved that the equilibrium of the Argentine rivers was not restored. Before getting lower the liquid mass must remain stationary, as in the case with the ocean before the ebb tide commences.
While Glenarvan and his cousin were making these observations, the report of firearms resounded frequently above their heads, and the jubilant outcries of the two sportsmen—for Paganel was every whit as much a child as Robert. They were having a fine time of it among the thick leaves, judging by the peals of laughter which rang out in the boy’s clear treble voice and Paganel’s deep bass. The chase was evidently successful, and wonders in culinary art might be expected. Wilson had a good idea to begin with, which he had skilfully carried out; for when Glenarvan came back to the brasier, he found that the brave fellow had actually managed to catch, with only a pin and a piece of string, several dozen small fish, as delicate as smelts, called MOJARRAS, which were all jumping about in a fold of his poncho, ready to be converted into an exquisite dish.
At the same moment the hunters reappeared. Paganel was carefully carrying some black swallows’ eggs, and a string of sparrows, which he meant to serve up later under the name of field larks. Robert had been clever enough to bring down several brace of HILGUEROS, small green and yellow birds, which are excellent eating, and greatly in demand in the Montevideo market. Paganel, who knew fifty ways of dressing eggs, was obliged for this once to be content with simply hardening them on the hot embers. But notwithstanding this, the viands at the meal were both dainty and varied. The dried beef, hard eggs, grilled MOJARRAS, sparrows, and roast HILGUEROS, made one of those gala feasts the memory of which is imperishable.
The conversation was very animated. Many compliments were paid Paganel on his twofold talents as hunter and cook, which the SAVANT accepted with the modesty which characterizes true merit. Then he turned the conversation on the peculiarities of the OMBU, under whose canopy they had found shelter, and whose depths he declared were immense.
“Robert and I,” he added, jestingly, “thought ourselves hunting in the open forest. I was afraid, for the minute, we should lose ourselves, for I could not find the road. The sun was sinking below the horizon; I sought vainly for footmarks; I began to feel the sharp pangs of hunger, and the gloomy depths of the forest resounded already with the roar of wild beasts. No, not that; there are no wild beasts here, I am sorry to say.”
“What!” exclaimed Glenarvan, “you are sorry there are no wild beasts?”
“Certainly I am.”
“And yet we should have every reason to dread their ferocity.”
“Their ferocity is nonexistent, scientifically speaking,” replied the learned geographer.
“Now come, Paganel,” said the Major, “you’ll never make me admit the utility of wild beasts. What good are they?”
“Why, Major,” exclaimed Paganel, “for purposes of classification into orders, and families, and species, and sub-species.”
“A mighty advantage, certainly!” replied McNabbs, “I could dispense with all that. If I had been one of Noah’s companions at the time of the deluge, I should most assuredly have hindered the imprudent patriarch from putting in pairs of lions, and tigers, and panthers, and bears, and such animals, for they are as malevolent as they are useless.”
“You would have done that?” asked Paganel.
“Yes, I would.”
“Well, you would have done wrong in a zoological point of view,” returned Paganel.
“But not in a humanitarian one,” rejoined the Major.
“It is shocking!” replied Paganel. “Why, for my part, on the contrary, I should have taken special care to preserve megatheriums and pterodactyles, and all the antediluvian species of which we are unfortunately deprived by his neglect.”
“And I say,” returned McNabbs, “that Noah did a very good thing when he abandoned them to their fate—that is, if they lived in his day.”
“And I say he did a very bad thing,” retorted Paganel, “and he has justly merited the malediction of SAVANTS to the end of time!”
The rest of the party could not help laughing at hearing the two friends disputing over old Noah. Contrary to all his principles, the Major, who all his life had never disputed with anyone, was always sparring with Paganel. The geographer seemed to have a peculiarly exciting effect on him.
Glenarvan, as usual, always the peacemaker, interfered in the debate, and said:
“Whether the loss of ferocious animals is to be regretted or not, in a scientific point of view, there is no help for it now; we must be content to do without them. Paganel can hardly expect to meet with wild beasts in this aerial forest.”
“Why not?” asked the geographer.
“Wild beasts on a tree!” exclaimed Tom Austin.
“Yes, undoubtedly. The American tiger, the jaguar, takes refuge in the trees, when the chase gets too hot for him. It is quite possible that one of these animals, surprised by the inundation,