for what good was there to diminish their energy in the hard efforts to escape? But when I returned on board I told Captain Nemo my fears.
“I know it,” he said, in that calm tone of his which the gravest danger could not alter; “it is only one danger more, and I do not see any way to avoid it. The only chance of safety is to work quicker than the solidification. We must be first, that’s all.”
We must be first! I had become accustomed to his manner of speech by this time.
During that day I wielded a pick vigorously for many hours. This toil sustained me. Besides, to work was to quit the Nautilus and to breathe the pure air supplied by the apparatus, to abandon a vitiated atmosphere.
Another yard was dug out by evening. When I returned on board I was almost choked by the carbonic acid gas with which the air was saturated. If we had only some chemical appliances with which to get rid of this deleterious gas! We had no want of oxygen. The water contained a very large quantity, and by decomposition we might restore the air. I had thought about it, but it was of no use to attempt it, as the carbonic produced by our respiration had permeated the vessel. To absorb it we must have some caustic potash, and work it about incessantly. Now we had none of this on board, and nothing else would do.
In the evening Captain Nemo let some fresh air escape from his reservoirs, and without it we certainly should not have lived.
Next day (March 26) I resumed my work in taking out the fifth yard. The sides and the upper ice began to thicken visibly. It was evident they would join together before the Nautilus could escape. Despair seized upon me for a moment, and my pickaxe fell from my grasp. What
