Works of Jules Verne/Adventures of Captain Hatteras/The English at the North Pole/Chapter 12
CHAPTER XII
CAPTAIN HATTERAS
The Forward steamed rapidly along through the open channel. Johnson took the wheel himself, and Shandon kept a vigilant look-out on the horizon. His joy was of short duration, for he soon saw that the channel terminated in a circle of mountains.
However, he determined to go on and take his chance, rather than turn back.
The dog ran beside the brig on the ice, but kept a good distance off. Strangely enough, however, if he got too far behind, a peculiar whistle was heard, which recalled him immediatly.
The first time this whistle was noticed, the sailors were all on deck. They looked about, but no stranger could be seen far or near, and yet the whistle was distinctly repeated several times.
Clifton was the first to sound an alarm.
"Do you hear that?" he asked; "and, look, how the animal bounds along when he is called."
"It is quite incredible," replied Gripper.
"This finishes it," exclaimed Pen. I'll go no farther."
"Pen is right," said Brunton. "It is tempting Heaven."
"Tempting the fiend!" replied Clifton. "I'd rather lose my share than go another step."
"We shall never return," said Bolton, in a dejected tone.
It was clear the crew were ripe for mutiny.
"Not another step! Are we all agreed on that?"
"Yes!" was the unanimous reply.
"Well, then," said Bolton, "let us go to Shandon; I'll be spokesman."
Off they went in a body to the poop.
The Forward was just entering at that moment a vast amphitheatre, perhaps about eight hundred feet in diameter, without a single outlet save the passage by which they had reached it.
Shandon felt he had imprisoned his ship and himself, but what was to be done? A heavy responsibility rested on his shoulders.
The Doctor folded his arms and silently gazed at the surrounding ice-walls, the average height of which was three hundred feet.
At that moment Bolton came up with his friends, and said in a voice trembling with excitement:
"Mr. Shandon, we cannot go farther."
"You say that to me?" exclaimed Shandon, his cheek crimsoning with passion.
"We say this, we have done enough for our invisible captain, and we have made up our minds to go no farther."
"You have made up your minds? You speak like that, Bolton? Take care."
"Your threats won't hinder us," said Pen, rudely.
Shandon had made a few steps towards this rebellious crew, when Johnson came up to him and said in a low voice:
"If we wish to get out of this there is not an instant to lose. An iceberg is fast nearing the channel, which may completely block it up, and keep us here prisoners."
After a brief survey, Shandon turned towards the men and said:
"You shall give an account of this conduct to me by-and-by. Meantime, turn about the ship."
The sailors rushed to their posts. The Forward shifted rapidly. Fresh fuel was supplied to the furnaces, and the engine worked at high pressure, for everything depended on speed. It was a race between the brig and the iceberg.
"Put on more steam!" shouted Shandon, and the engineer obeyed at all risks, almost endangering the safety of the brig; but his efforts were in vain. The iceberg had been caught by some deep-sea current, and was bearing down fast towards the passage. The brig was still more than three cables' length off when the berg entered, and, adhering firmly to the ice on either side, shut up the outlet entirely.
"We are lost!" exclaimed Shandon, imprudently.
"Lost!" re-echoed from the crew.
"Let each take care of himself!" said one.
"Try the boats!" said another.
"Let's go to the stores!" said Pen. "If we are to be drowned, we may as well drown ourselves in gin."
The general disorder had reached its highest pitch, and broken all bounds. Shandon felt himself powerless. His tongue seemed palsied, and the power of speech forsook him. The Doctor paced up and down in an agitated manner, while Johnson folded his arms, and maintained a stoical silence.
Suddenly a loud, commanding, impressive voice thundered out the words:
"Every man to his post Stop the ship!"
Johnson instinctively obeyed, and it was high time, for the Forward was steaming along at such a rate, that, before another minute, it must have dashed against the rocky walls.
But Johnson was the only man that obeyed. Shandon, Clawbonny, and the entire crew, even the stoker and the cook, assembled on deck, and they all saw a man coming out of the captain's cabin, the mysterious cabin, so closely locked hitherto, the key of which was in the captain's sole possession. This man was none other than the sailor Garry.
"Sir," said Shandon, turning pale. "Garry, you—what right have you to command?"
"Duk!" called Garry, giving the same identical whistle which had so perplexed the crew.
At the sound of his right name the dog gave one bound on to the poop, and stretched himself quietly at his master's feet. Not one of the crew said a word. The possession of the key, the dog sent by him, which now proved, as it were, his identity, together with the tone of command, which it was impossible to mistake, had a great effect on the minds of the men, and sufficed to establish Garry's authority.
Besides, Garry was hardly recognizable. He had shaved off his big whiskers, and his face appeared more impassive than before, and more energetic and imperious. He was dressed now as befitted his rank, and had the air of one used to command.
The crew were quite taken by storm, and, with sailor-like mobility of character, burst out in loud cheers for the captain, who desired Shandon to muster them in order, as he wished to inspect them. When they were all drawn up in file, he passed along in front of them and had a suitable word to say to each, treating them according to their past conduct.
Then he mounted the poop, and in a calm voice said:
"Officers and sailors, I am an Englishman like yourselves, and my motto is that of Admiral Nelson, England expects every man to do his duty."
"As an Englishman I am unwilling, we are unwilling, that any should be braver than ourselves, and venture where we have not been. As an Englishman it vexes me, it vexes us, that others should have the glory of penetrating the Artic regions farther than ourselves. If ever human foot shall tread on polar ground, it must be the foot of an Englishman. See, yonder waves your country's flag! I have fitted out this ship, I have consecrated my fortune to this enterprise, I will consecrate my life and yours to it, but that flag shall float over the North Pole. Have no fear. For each degree north you make from this day you shall receive £1000 sterling. We have only reached the 72nd yet, and there are 90. My name will guarantee my good faith. I am Captain Hatteras!"
"Captain Hatteras!" exclaimed Shandon.
This name had an ominous sound, for he was well known among sailors as a man who stuck at nothing to gain his end, and had little regard for his own or any other man's life
"And now," resumed Hatteras, "let the brig be anchored to icebergs, and order the furnaces to be put out. Each man resume his usual occupation; and, Shandon, I wish to speak with you in my cabin. I must talk matters over with you and the Doctor, and Johnson and Wall. Boatswain, dismiss the men."
And who was this Hatteras? He was the only son of a brewer in London, who left an immense fortune. He went to sea in early youth, notwithstanding his brilliant prospects. Not that he had any love for the merchant service; but he had a burning longing after geographical discoveries. Lean and wiry in body, like most men of sanguine temperament, of average height, well-knit frame, and muscles like iron; with a calm, rigid face, and thin, compressed lips, and cold though fine eyes, he looked the very personification of a man who would stick at nothing. He was one who would never draw back from what he had begun, and who would stake other men's lives as deliberately as his own. People had need think twice before committing themselves to any of his projects.
John Hatteras had all the pride of an Englishman to excess. It was he that said one day to a Frenchman, who, with true national courtesy, tried to pay him a compliment, by declaring that if he had not been a Frenchman he should have wished to be an Englishman: "And I, sir, if I had not been an Englishman, should have wished to be an Englishman."
The speech showed the man. His most ardent desire was that his country should have the monopoly in geographical discoveries, and it was a great grief to him that in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries England had no place in the glorious phalanx of navigators. True, in modern times she can boast her roll of illustrious names; but that was not enough to satisfy Hatteras; he must needs invent a country to have the honor of finding it. He had remarked the fact, that though the English were far behind in respect of discovery, there was one corner of the globe where their efforts seemed concentrated—the Arctic regions. He was not content with the successful search for the North-West Passage; the Pole itself must be reached, and he had twice made the attempt in vessels equipped at his own expense. To accomplish this was the one purpose of his life.
After several prosperous voyages in the southern seas, Hatteras made his first venture north by Baffin's Bay, in his sloop, the Halifax, but did not succeed in getting higher than the 74th degree of latitude. The sufferings of his crew were frightful, and his foolhardy daring was carried to such a pitch that the sailors had little inclination for another voyage under such a captain.
However, in 1850, Hatteras equipped a schooner, the Farewell, and managed to enlist twenty gallant fellows in his service, but only by throwing out the tempting bait of high wages. It was at that time that Dr. Clawbonny wrote to him, requesting to take part in the expedition; but the post of surgeon was already filled up, and fortunate it was for the Doctor.
The Farwell pushed as far north as the 76th degree, but there she was forced to winter. The crew were exposed to so many hardships, and the cold was so intense, that not a man survived but John Hatteras himself, and he was rescued by a Danish whaler, after a march across the ice of two hundred miles
His return alone produced a great sensation in Liverpool. Who would ever dare to accompany Hatteras again in his mad attempts? Yet he himself never despaired, and his father just then died, leaving him a nabob's fortune.
In the interim, a brig, the Advance, manned by seventeen men, and commanded by Dr. Kane, was sent out by Grinnell, an American merchant, to the discovery of Franklin. It got as far, by Baffin's Bay and Smith's Straits, as the 82nd degree—nearer the Pole than any previous adventurers.
The vessel was American, Grinnell was American, Kane was American. This fact was a great grief to Hatteras, and the mortification of being outstripped by the Yankees rankled in his heart. He resolved that, come what might, he would distance them all and reach the Pole.
For two years he had been living in Liverpool, preserving a strict incognito. He passed for a sailor; he discovered the man he wanted in Richard Shandon, and made proposals both to him and Dr. Clawbonny by anonymous letters. The Forward was built, manned, and equipped. Hatteras took care to keep his name a secret, for he would not have found a single sailor to follow him. He determined not to take command of the brig unless compelled by imperative necessity, and not till the crew had gone too far to recede. He had also, as we have seen, kept such tempting offerings as glittering gold in reserve, that the poor fellows could not have refused to follow him to the world's end.
And to the world's end, indeed, it was that he vowed to go.
Now that affairs had come to a crisis, John Hatteras hesitated no longer to proclaim himself openly. His dog, the faithful Duk, who had been the companion of his voyages, was the first to acknowledge him, and happily for the brave, and unhappily for the timid, it was settled beyond dispute that the captain of the Forward was John Hatteras.