Part 17

It was indeed a marsh, whose extent, as far as that rounded coast which closed the island to the southeast, might measure twenty square miles. The soil was formed of an argillaceous siliceous mud, mingled with numerous vegetable debris. Confervae, rushes, sedges, bulrushes, here and there some layers of herbage, thick as a heavy carpet, covered it. A few frozen pools sparkled in many places under the solar rays. Neither the rains nor any river, swollen by a sudden flood, had been able to form these reserves of water. It was natural to conclude that this swamp was fed by the infiltrations of the soil, and so it was in fact. It was even to be feared that the air might, during the heats, become charged with those miasmas which engender marsh fevers. Above the aquatic plants, on the surface of the stagnant waters, fluttered a world of birds.

Hunters in the marsh and professional fowlers could not have wasted a single shot.

Wild ducks, mallards, teals, snipes lived there in flocks, and these timid fowls allowed themselves to be easily approached. A charge of shot would certainly have struck some dozens of these birds, so close were their ranks. They had to content themselves with striking them with arrows. The result was less, but the silent arrow had the advantage of not frightening these volatiles, which the detonation of a firearm would have scattered to all corners of the marsh. The hunters therefore contented themselves, for this time, with a dozen ducks, white of body with a cinnamon band, green head, black, white and ruddy wing, flattened beak, which Harbert recognized as "sheldrakes."

Top adroitly assisted in the capture of these volatiles, whose name was given to this marshy part of the island. The colonists therefore had there an abundant reserve of waterfowl. When the time came, it would be only a matter of exploiting it properly, and it was probable that several species of these birds might be, if not domesticated, at least acclimatized in the vicinity of the lake, which would place them more directly at the disposal of the consumers.

Towards five o'clock in the evening, Cyrus Smith and his companions took the road back to their dwelling, crossing the Sheldrake Marsh (Tadorn's-fens), and they recrossed the Mercy on the bridge of ice.

At eight o'clock in the evening, all had returned to Granite-House.

CHAPTER XXII

These intense colds lasted until the 15th of August, without however exceeding that maximum of Fahrenheit degrees observed hitherto. When the atmosphere was calm, this low temperature was easily borne; but when the north wind blew, it seemed hard to people insufficiently clothed. Pencroff was beginning to regret that Lincoln Island did not shelter some families of bears, rather than those foxes or those seals, whose fur left much to be desired.

"Bears," said he, "are generally well dressed, and I should ask nothing better than to borrow from them for the winter the warm greatcoat they have on their backs."

"But," replied Nab, laughing, "perhaps those bears would not consent, Pencroff, to give you their greatcoat. They are not Saint Martins, those beasts!"

"We should compel them, Nab, we should compel them," replied Pencroff in a thoroughly authoritative tone. But these formidable carnivores did not exist in the island, or, at least, they had not shown themselves hitherto.

However, Harbert, Pencroff and the reporter occupied themselves with setting traps on the Grand-View plateau and at the outskirts of the forest. According to the sailor's opinion, any animal, whatever it might be, would be good take, and rodents or carnivores who should inaugurate the new snares would be well received at Granite-House.

These traps were, moreover, extremely simple: pits dug in the ground, above them a roofing of branches and grasses, which concealed the opening, at the bottom some bait whose odor might attract the animals, and that was all. It must be said also that they had not been dug at random, but in certain places where more numerous imprints indicated frequent passages of quadrupeds. Every day they were visited, and, on three occasions, during the first days, there were found in them specimens of those culpeus which had already been seen on the right bank of the Mercy.

"Ah, then there are nothing but foxes in this country!" cried Pencroff, the third time he drew one of these animals from the pit where it stood very sheepishly. "Beasts that are good for nothing!"

"But yes," said Gideon Spilett. "They are good for something!"

"And for what?"

"For making baits to attract others!"

The reporter was right, and the traps were thenceforth baited with these fox carcasses.

The sailor had also manufactured snares employing the fibers of the curry-rush, and the snares gave more profit than the traps. It was rare that a day passed without some warren rabbit being caught. It was always rabbit, but Nab knew how to vary his sauces, and the guests did not think of complaining.

However, once or twice, in the second week of August, the traps delivered to the hunters animals other than culpeus, and more useful. These were some of those peccaries which had already been signaled to the north of the lake. Pencroff had no need to ask if those beasts were edible. That was plainly seen, by their resemblance to the pig of America or of Europe.

"But they are not pigs, I warn you, Pencroff," said Harbert.

"My boy," replied the sailor, leaning over the trap, and drawing out by the small appendage which served it as a tail one of these representatives of the suillian family, "let me believe that they are pigs!"

"And why?"

"Because it gives me pleasure!"

"Do you then like the pig so much, Pencroff?"

"I like the pig very much," answered the sailor, "especially for its feet, and if it had eight instead of four, I should like it twice as much!"

As for the animals in question, they were peccaries belonging to one of the four genera which the family comprises, and they were even of the species of the "tajassous," recognizable by their dark color and destitute of those long canines which arm the mouth of their congeners. These peccaries live ordinarily in troops, and it was probable that they abounded in the wooded parts of the island. In any case, they were edible from head to foot, and Pencroff asked no more of them.

Towards the 15th of August, the atmospheric state changed suddenly by a shift of wind to the northwest.

The temperature rose a few degrees, and the vapors accumulated in the air soon resolved into snow. The whole island was covered with a white layer, and showed itself to its inhabitants under a new aspect. This snow fell abundantly during several days, and its thickness soon reached two feet.

The wind freshened soon with extreme violence, and, from the height of Granite-House, the sea could be heard roaring on the reefs. At certain angles, rapid eddies of air were formed, and the snow, shaping itself there into high turning columns, resembled those liquid waterspouts which pirouette on their base, and which ships attack with cannon shots.

However, the hurricane, coming from the northwest, took the island in reverse, and the orientation of Granite-House preserved it from a direct assault. But, in the midst of this snowstorm, as terrible as if it had been produced on some polar region, neither Cyrus Smith nor his companions could, despite their wish, venture outside, and they remained shut up during five days, from the 20th to the 25th of August. The tempest could be heard raging in the Jacamar woods, which must suffer from it. Many trees would be uprooted, no doubt, but Pencroff consoled himself by thinking he would not have the trouble of felling them.

"The wind is playing lumberjack, let it do so," he repeated.

And, besides, there would have been no way to prevent it.

How much the hosts of Granite-House then had to thank heaven for having provided them this solid and unshakable retreat! Cyrus Smith had certainly his legitimate share in the thanks, but, after all, it was nature which had hollowed this vast cavern, and he had only discovered it. There, all were in safety, and the blows of the tempest could not reach them. If they had constructed on the Grand-View plateau a house of brick and wood, it would certainly not have resisted the furies of this hurricane. As to the Chimneys, only by the noise of the waves which made itself heard with so much force, it must be believed that they were absolutely uninhabitable, for the sea, passing over the islet, must beat them with rage. But here, at Granite-House, in the midst of this massif, against which neither water nor air had hold, nothing to fear.

During these few days of sequestration, the colonists did not remain inactive. The wood, sawn into planks, was not lacking in the storeroom, and, little by little, they completed the furniture, in tables and chairs, solid surely, for the material was not spared. These pieces of furniture, a little heavy, ill justified their name, which makes of their mobility an essential condition, but they were the pride of Nab and Pencroff, who would not have exchanged them for Boule furniture.

Then, the carpenters became basket-makers, and they succeeded not badly in this new manufacture. There had been discovered, towards that point which the lake projected to the north, a fruitful osier-bed, where grew in great number purple osiers. Before the rainy season, Pencroff and Harbert had harvested these useful shrubs, and their branches, well separated then, could be effectively employed. The first attempts were shapeless, but, thanks to the skill and intelligence of the workers, consulting each other, recalling the models they had seen, rivaling each other, baskets and hampers of divers sizes soon increased the equipment of the colony. The storeroom was supplied with them, and Nab enclosed in special hampers his harvests of rhizomes, of pin-nut almonds and of dragon-tree roots.

During the last week of this month of August, the weather changed once more. The temperature fell a little, and the storm calmed. The colonists rushed outside. There were certainly two feet of snow on the beach, but, on the surface of this hardened snow, one could walk without too much difficulty. Cyrus Smith and his companions mounted the Grand-View plateau. What a change! These woods, which they had left green, especially in the neighboring part where conifers dominated, then disappeared under a uniform color. All was white, from the summit of Mount Franklin to the shore, the forests, the prairie, the lake, the river, the beaches.

The water of the Mercy ran under a vault of ice which, at each flux and reflux, broke up and shattered with noise. Numerous birds fluttered at the solid surface of the lake, ducks and snipes, mallards and guillemots. There were thousands of them. The rocks between which the waterfall poured at the edge of the plateau were bristling with ice. One would have said that the water escaped from a monstrous gargoyle carved with all the fancy of a Renaissance artist. As to judging the damage caused to the forest by the hurricane, that could not yet be done, and it was necessary to wait until the immense white layer had dissipated.

Gideon Spilett, Pencroff and Harbert did not miss this occasion to go visit their traps.

They did not find them easily, under the snow which covered them. They had even to take care not to let themselves fall into one or the other, which would have been dangerous and humiliating at once: to be caught in one's own snare! But finally they avoided this disagreeable thing, and found the traps perfectly intact. No animal had fallen into them, and, however, the imprints were numerous in the surroundings, among others certain marks of claws very clearly accentuated. Harbert did not hesitate to affirm that some carnivore of the feline genus had passed there, which justified the engineer's opinion on the presence of dangerous wild beasts in Lincoln Island. No doubt, these wild beasts ordinarily inhabited the thick forests of the Far-West, but, pressed by hunger, they had ventured as far as the Grand-View plateau. Perhaps they scented the hosts of Granite-House?

"After all, what are these felines?" asked Pencroff.

"They are tigers," answered Harbert.

"I thought those beasts were only found in hot countries?"

"On the new continent," answered the young boy, "they are observed from Mexico to the Pampas of Buenos-Ayres. Now, as Lincoln Island is almost under the same latitude as the provinces of the Plata, it is not astonishing that some tigers are met with there."

"Very well, we shall be on our guard," answered Pencroff.

However, the snow finally dissipated under the influence of the temperature, which rose again. The rain came to fall, and, thanks to its dissolving action, the white layer was effaced. Despite the bad weather, the colonists renewed their reserve in all things, pin-nut almonds, dragon-tree roots, rhizomes, maple liquor, for the vegetable part; warren rabbits, agoutis and kangaroos, for the animal part. That necessitated some excursions in the forest, and it was ascertained that a certain quantity of trees had been thrown down by the last hurricane. The sailor and Nab even pushed, with the cart, as far as the coal bed, in order to bring back some tons of fuel. They saw in passing that the chimney of the pottery furnace had been very damaged by the wind and decrowned of six good feet at least. At the same time as the coal, the provision of wood was also renewed at Granite-House, and advantage was taken of the current of the Mercy, which had become free again, to bring down several trains. It might be that the period of great colds was not finished. A visit had also been made to the Chimneys, and the colonists could only congratulate themselves on not having dwelt there during the tempest. The sea had left there incontestable marks of its ravages.

Lifted by the offshore winds, and leaping over the islet, it had violently assailed the galleries, which were half buried in sand, and thick layers of wrack covered the rocks. While Nab, Harbert and Pencroff hunted or renewed the provisions of fuel, Cyrus Smith and Gideon Spilett occupied themselves with clearing the Chimneys, and they found the forge and the furnaces almost intact, protected as they had been at first by the heaping up of the sands.

It was not uselessly that the reserve of fuel had been remade. The colonists had not done with the rigorous colds. It is known that, in the northern hemisphere, the month of February is principally marked by great lowerings of temperature. It must have been the same in the southern hemisphere, and the end of the month of August, which is the February of North America, did not escape this climatic law.

Towards the 25th, after a new alternation of snow and rain, the wind shifted to the southeast, and, suddenly, the cold became extremely keen. According to the engineer's estimate, the mercurial column of a Fahrenheit thermometer would not have marked less than eight degrees below zero (22 degrees centigrade below freezing), and this intensity of cold, rendered more painful still by a sharp north wind, maintained itself during several days. The colonists had again to quarter themselves in Granite-House, and, as it was necessary to hermetically obstruct all the openings of the facade, leaving only the strict passage for the renewal of air, the consumption of candles was considerable.

In order to economize them, the colonists often lighted themselves only with the flame of the hearths, where fuel was not spared. Several times, some or others went down on the beach, amid the iceblocks which the flood piled there at each tide, but they soon remounted to Granite-House, and it was not without difficulty and without pain that their hands held to the bars of the ladder. By this intense cold, the rungs burned their fingers.

It was still necessary to occupy these leisure hours which the sequestration made for the hosts of Granite-House.

Cyrus Smith then undertook an operation which could be practiced behind closed doors.

It is known that the colonists had at their disposal no other sugar than this liquid substance which they drew from the maple, by making deep incisions in that tree. It sufficed them therefore to gather this liquor in vessels, and they employed it in this state for divers culinary uses, and all the better, as, with age, the liquor tended to whiten and to take a sirupy consistency.

But there was better to do, and one day Cyrus Smith announced to his companions that they were going to transform themselves into refiners.

"Refiners!" answered Pencroff. "That is a somewhat hot trade, I believe?"

"Very hot!" answered the engineer.

"Then it will be in season!" replied the sailor.

Let not this word of refining evoke in the mind the remembrance of those factories complicated in tools and in workmen. No! to crystallize this liquor, it sufficed to purify it by an operation which was extremely easy. Placed on the fire in large earthen vessels, it was simply submitted to a certain evaporation, and soon a scum rose to its surface. As soon as it began to thicken, Nab took care to stir it with a wooden spatula, -- which should accelerate its evaporation and prevent it at the same time from contracting an empyreumatic taste.

After some hours of boiling on a good fire, which did as much good to the operators as to the substance operated upon, the latter had transformed itself into a thick syrup. This syrup was poured into clay molds, previously fabricated in the very furnace of the kitchen, and to which had been given varied forms. The next day, this syrup, cooled, formed loaves and tablets. It was sugar, of a somewhat brown color, but almost transparent and of a perfect taste.

The cold continued until the middle of September, and the prisoners of Granite-House began to find their captivity very long. Almost every day, they attempted some sorties which could not be prolonged. They worked therefore constantly at the arrangement of the dwelling. They talked while working.

Cyrus Smith instructed his companions in all things, and he explained to them especially the practical applications of science. The colonists had no library at their disposal; but the engineer was a book always ready, always open at the page of which each had need, a book which resolved for them all questions and which they often leafed through. Time passed thus, and these brave people did not seem to dread the future.

However, it was time that this sequestration should end. All were eager to see again, if not the fine season, at least the cessation of this insupportable cold. If only they had been clothed in a manner to be able to brave it, what excursions they would have attempted, whether to the dunes, or to the Sheldrake Marsh! The game must have been easy to approach, and the hunt would have been fruitful, assuredly. But Cyrus Smith held that no one should compromise his health, for he had need of all hands, and his counsels were followed.

But, it must be said, the most impatient of this imprisonment, after Pencroff however, was Top. The faithful dog found himself much cramped in Granite-House. He went and came from one room to the other, and testified in his manner his boredom at being quartered.

Cyrus Smith remarked often that, when he approached that dark well, which was in communication with the sea, and whose orifice opened at the bottom of the storeroom, Top made singular growlings heard. Top turned around this hole, which had been covered with a wooden panel. Sometimes even, he sought to slip his paws under this panel, as if he would have lifted it.

He then yelped in a peculiar fashion, which indicated at once anger and uneasiness.

The engineer observed this maneuver several times. What then was there in this abyss which could impress to this point the intelligent animal? The well led to the sea, that was certain. Did it then ramify in narrow bowels through the framework of the island?

Was it in communication with some other interior cavities? Did some marine monster come, from time to time, to breathe at the bottom of this well? The engineer knew not what to think, and could not restrain himself from dreaming of bizarre complications. Accustomed to go far in the domain of scientific realities, he did not forgive himself for letting himself be drawn into the domain of the strange and almost of the supernatural; but how to explain that Top, one of those sensible dogs who have never lost their time barking at the moon, persisted in sounding with scent and hearing this abyss, if nothing passed there which should awaken his uneasiness? The conduct of Top intrigued Cyrus Smith more than it appeared reasonable to him to avow to himself. In any case, the engineer communicated his impressions only to Gideon Spilett, finding it useless to initiate his companions into the involuntary reflections which were born in him from what was perhaps only a whim of Top. Finally, the colds ceased. There were rains, gusts mixed with snow, sleet, squalls, but these intemperances did not last. The ice had dissolved, the snow had melted; the beach, the plateau, the banks of the Mercy, the forest, had become passable again.

This return of spring delighted the hosts of Granite-House, and, soon, they passed there only the hours of sleep and of meals.

They hunted much in the second half of September, which brought Pencroff to reclaim with a new insistence the firearms which he affirmed had been promised by Cyrus Smith.

The latter, knowing well that, without a special tooling, it would be almost impossible for him to fabricate a gun which could render any service, always drew back and postponed the operation to later. He made, besides, observe that Harbert and Gideon Spilett had become skillful archers, that all sorts of excellent animals, agoutis, kangaroos, cabiais, pigeons, bustards, wild ducks, snipes, finally furred or feathered game, fell under their arrows, and that, consequently, one could wait. But the obstinate sailor did not hear of it in this ear, and he would give the engineer no rest until the latter had satisfied his desire. Gideon Spilett supported, moreover, Pencroff.

"If the island, as may be doubted, contains ferocious animals," said he, "it must be thought to combat them and to exterminate them. A moment may come when that is our first duty."

But, at this epoch, it was not this question of firearms which preoccupied Cyrus Smith, but that of clothing. Those which the colonists wore had passed the winter, but they could not last until next winter. Skins of carnivores or wool of ruminants, that was what must be procured at any price, and, since the moufflons were not lacking, it was fitting to consider the means of forming a flock which would be raised for the needs of the colony. An enclosure destined for domestic animals, a poultry-yard arranged for the volatiles, in a word, a sort of farm to found in some point of the island, such were the two important projects to execute during the fine season. In consequence, and in view of these future establishments, it became therefore urgent to push a reconnaissance into all the unknown part of Lincoln Island, that is to say under these high forests which extended on the right of the Mercy, from its mouth to the extremity of the Serpentine peninsula, as well as on all the western coast.

But a sure time was needed, and a month was still to elapse before this exploration could be usefully undertaken.

They were waiting therefore with a certain impatience, when an incident occurred, which came to still further excite this desire which the colonists had to visit entirely their domain.

It was the 24th of October. That day, Pencroff had gone to visit the traps, which he always kept properly baited. In one of them, he found three animals which must be welcome in the larder. It was a female peccary and her two young.

“Stories of the world, in your language.”