such satisfactory replies, that I do not dare to express a doubt. But if I am obliged to accept the Rouquayrol and Ruhmkorff apparatus, I must make a reservation in regard to the gun with which you will arm me.”
“But it is not an ordinary gun,” replied the captain. “We do not use powder.”
“It is an air-gun, then?”
“Certainly. How did you fancy I could make gunpowder on board, having neither saltpetre, sulphur, nor carbon.”
“Besides,” I said, “to fire under water in a surrounding medium, 855 times denser than the air, you must overcome a tremendous resistance.”
“That need not affect the question. Certain cannons exist, improved upon Fulton’s idea by the Englishmen Coles and Burley, by the Frenchman Farcy, and the Italian Laudi, which are made upon a particular system, and can be used under these conditions. But I repeat, that having no powder, I have to replace it by air at high pressure, which I can obtain in abundance by means of the pumps of the Nautilus.”
“But this air must be rapidly expended.”
“Well! have I not my Rouquayrol reservoir, which can furnish me with a supply at a pinch. A tap is sufficient. But you will see for yourself, M. Aronnax, that during our submarine shooting there is no great expenditure of air or bullets.”
“Yet it seems to me that, in the semi-darkness, and in a medium much denser than the atmospheric air, the bullets would not travel far, and would not be frequently mortal.”
“Monsieur, on the contrary, all hits made by this gun
