Join Host Bree Carlile as she reads the thirty-seventh chapter of Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea.

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Today we'll be continuing 20,000 leaks under the sea by Jules Verne chapter 14 the South Pole I rushed onto the platform.

Yes, the open sea with but a few scattered pieces of ice and moving icebergs, a long stretch of sea, a world of birds in the air, and myriads of fish under those waters, which varied from intense blue to olive green.

According to the bottom, the thermometer marked three degrees celsius.

Above zero.

It was comparatively spring shut up as we were behind this iceberg, whose lengthened mass was dimly seen on our northern horizon.

Are we at the pole?

I asked the captain with a beating heart.

I do not know, he replied.

At noon I will take our bearings.

But will the sun show himself through this fog?

Said I, looking at the leaden sky.

However little it shows, it'll be enough, replied the captain.

About 10 miles south, a solitary island rose to a height of 104 yards.

We made for it, but carefully, for the sea might be strewn with banks.

1 hour afterwards we had reached it.

2 hours later we had made the round of it.

It measured four or 5 miles in circumference.

A narrow canal separated it from a considerable stretch of land, perhaps a continent, for we could not see its limits.

The existence of this land seemed to give some color to Maury's theory.

The ingenious American is remarked that between the South Pole and the 60th parallel the sea is covered with floating ice of enormous size, which is never met within the north Atlantic.

From this fact he has drawn the conclusion that the antarctic circle encloses considerable continents, as icebergs cannot form an open sea, but only on the coasts.

According to these calculations, the mass of ice surrounding the southern pole forms a vast cap, the circumference of which must be at least 2500 miles.

But the nautilus, for fear of running aground, had stopped about three cable lengths from a strand over which reared a superb heap of rocks.

The boat was launched.

The captain, two of his men bearing instruments, conceal and myself were in it.

It was ten in the morning.

I had not seen Ned land.

Doubtless the Canadian did not wish to admit the presence of the south pole.

A few strokes of the ore brought us to the sand where we ran ashore.

Conceal was going to jump onto the land when I held him back.

Sir, said I to Captain Nemo, to you belongs the honor of first setting foot on this land.

Yes, sir, said the captain.

And if I do not hesitate to tread this south pole, it is because up to this time no human being has left a trace there.

Saying this, he jumped lightly onto the sand.

His heart beat with emotion.

He climbed a rock sloping to a little promontory, and there, with his arms crossed, mute and motionless, and with an eager look, he seemed to take possession of these southern regions.

After five minutes passed in this ecstasy he turned to us.

When you like, sir.

I landed, followed by conceal, leaving the two men in the boat for a long way.

The soil was composed of a reddish sandy stone, something like crushed brick, scorii, streams of lava and pumice stones.

One could not mistake its volcanic origin.

In some parts, slight curls of smoke emitted a sulphurous smell, proving that the internal fires had lost nothing of their expansive powers.

Though having climbed a high eclivity, I could see no volcano for a radius of several miles.

We know that in those antarctic countries James Ross found two craters, the arabis and terror, in full activity on the 167th meridian.

Latitude 77 degrees, 32 minutes.

The vegetation of this desolate continent seemed to me much restricted.

Some lichens lay upon the black rocks, some microscopic plants, rudimentary diatomas, a kind of cells placed between two quartz shells.

Long purple and scarlet weed supported on little swimming bladders which the breaking of the waves brought to the shore.

These constituted the meager floor of this region.

The shore was strewn with mollusks, little mussels and limpets.

I also saw myriads of northern cleos, one and a quarter inches long, of which a whale would swallow a whole world at a mouthful.

And some perfect sea butterflies animating the waters on the skirts of the shore.

There appeared on the high bottom some coral shrubs of the kind which, according to James Ross, live in the antarctic seas to the depth of more than 1000 yards.

Then there were little kingfishers and starfish studying the soil where life abounded.

Most was in the air.

There thousands of birds fluttered and flew of all kinds, deafening us with their cries.

Others crowded the rock, looking at us as we passed by without fear and pressing familiarly close by our feet.

There were penguins, so agile in the water, heavy and awkward as they're on the ground.

They were uttering harsh cries, a large assembly, sober in gesture, but extravagant in clamor.

Albatrosses passed in the air, the expanse of their wings being at least four yards and a half and justly called the vultures of the ocean.

Some gigantic petrols and some damirs, a kind of small duck, the under part of whose body is black and white.

Then there were a whole series of petrols, some whitish, with brown bordered wings, others blue, peculiar to the antarctic seas, and so oily, as I told conceal that the inhabitants of the pharaoh islands had nothing to do before lighting them, but to put a wick in.

A little more, said conceal, and they would be perfect lamps after that.

We cannot expect nature to have previously furnished them with wicks.

About half a mile farther on, the soil was riddled with rough's nests, a sort of laying ground out of which many birds were issuing.

Captain Nemo had some hundreds hunted.

They uttered a cry like the brain of an a**, or about the size of a goose, slate color on the body, white beneath, with a yellow line round their throats.

They allowed themselves to be killed with a stone, never trying to escape.

But the fog did not lift, and at eleven, the sun had not yet shown itself.

Its absence made me uneasy.

Without it, no observations were possible.

How, then, could we decide whether we had reached the pole?

When we rejoined Captain Nemo, I found him leaning on a piece of rock, silently watching the sky.

He seemed impatient and vexed.

But what was to be done?

This rash and powerful man could not command the sun as he did the sea.

Noon arrived without the orb of day showing itself.

For an instant, we could not even tell its position behind the curtain of fog.

And soon the fog turned to snow.

Till tomorrow, said the captain quietly, and we returned to the nautilus.

Amid these atmospheric disturbances, the tempest of snow continued till the next day.

It was impossible to remain on the platform.

From the saloon, where I was taking notes of incidents happening during this excursion to the polar continent.

I could hear the cries of petrols and albatrosses sporting in the midst of this violent storm.

The nautilus did not remain motionless, but skirted the coast, advancing 10 miles more to the south in the half light left by the sun as it skirted the edge of the horizon.

The next day, the 20 march, the snow had ceased.

The cold was a little greater, the thermometer showing two degrees below zero.

The fog was rising, and I hoped that that day our observations might be taken.

Captain Nemo, not having yet appeared, the boat took conceal in myself to land.

The soil was still of the same volcanic nature.

Everywhere were traces of lava, scori, and basalt.

But the crater which had vomited them, I could not see here.

As lowered down.

This continent was alive with myriads of birds.

But their rule was now divided, with large troops of sea mammals looking at us with their soft eyes.

There were several kinds of seals, some stretched on the earth, some on flakes of ice, many going in and out of the sea.

They did not flee at our approach, never having had anything to do with man.

And I reckoned that there were provisions there for hundreds of vessels.

Sir, said conceal, will you tell me the names of these creatures?

They are seals and morses.

It was now eight in the morning.

4 hours remained to us before the sun could be observed.

With advantage, I directed our steps towards a vast bay cut in the steep granite shore.

There I can aver that earth and ice were lost at sight by the numbers of sea mammals covering them.

And I involuntarily sought for old Proteus, the mythological shepherd, who watched these immense flocks of Neptune.

There were more seals than anything else, forming distinct groups, male and female.

The father watching over his family, the mother suckling her little ones, some already strong enough to go a few steps when they wished to change their plates.

They took little jumps made by the contraction of their bodies and helped awkwardly enough by their imperfect fin, which, as with the laminton, their cousins, forms a perfect forearm.

I should say that in the water, which is their element, the spine of these creatures is flexible, with smooth and closed skin and webbed feet.

They swim admirably in rusting on the earth, they take the most graceful attitudes.

Thus the ancients, observing their soft and expressive looks, which cannot be surpassed by the most beautiful look a woman can give.

Their clear, voluptuous eyes, their charming positions, and the poetry of their manners, metamorphose them.

The male into a triton and the female into a mermaid.

I made conceal notice the considerable development of the lobes of the brain in these interesting cetaceans.

No mammal, except man has such a quantity of brain matter.

They are also capable of receiving a certain amount of education, are easily domesticated, and I think with other naturalists, that if properly taught, they would be of great service as fishing dogs.

The greater part of them slept on the rocks or on the sand.

Amongst these seals, properly so called, which have no external ears, in which they differ from the otter, whose ears are prominent, I noticed several varieties of seals, about three yards long with a white coat, bulldog heads armed with teeth in both jaws, four incisors at the top and four at the bottom, and two large canine teeth in the shape of a florida lee.

Amongst them glided sea elephants, a kind of seal with short, flexible trunks.

The giants of this species measured 20ft round and ten yards and a half in length, but they did not move as we approached.

These creatures are not dangerous?

Asked conceal?

No, not unless you attack them when they have to defend.

They're young, their rage is terrible, and it is not uncommon for them to break the fishing boats to pieces.

They are quite right, said Conceal.

I do not say they are not.

2 miles further on, we were stopped by the promontory which shelters the bay from the southerly winds.

Beyond it, we heard loud bellowings, such as a troop of ruminants would produce.

Good, said conceal.

A concert of bulls?

No, a concert of morses.

They are fighting.

They are either fighting or playing.

We now began to climb the blackish rocks amid unforeseen stumbles and over stones which the ice made slippery.

More than once I rolled over at the expense of my loins.

Conceal, more prudent or more steady, did not stumble, and helped me up, saying, if, sir, you would have the kindness to take wider steps, you would preserve your equilibrium better.

Arrived at the upper ridge of the promontory, I saw a vast white plain covered with morses.

They were playing amongst themselves, and what we heard were bellowings of pleasure, not of anger.

As I passed these curious animals, I could examine them leisurely, for they did not move.

Their skins were thick and rugged, of a yellowish tint approaching to red.

Their hair was short and scant some of them were four yards and a quarter long.

Quieter and less timid than their cousins of the north.

They did not, like them, place sentinels around the outskirts of their encampment.

After examining the city of Morses, I began to think of returning.

It was 11:00 and if Captain Nemo found the conditions favorable for observations, I wished to be present at the operation.

We followed a narrow pathway running along the summit of the steep shore.

30 we had reached the place where we landed.

The boat had run aground, bringing the captain.

I saw him standing on a block of basalt, his instruments near him, his eyes fixed on the northern horizon, near which the sun was then describing a lengthened curve.

I took my place beside him and waited without speaking.

Noon arrived, and as before, the sun did not appear.

It was fatality.

Observations were still wanting.

If not accomplished tomorrow, we must give up all idea of taking any.

We were indeed exactly at the 20 March.

Tomorrow, the 21 would be the equinox.

The sun would disappear behind the horizon for six months, and with its disappearance, the long polar night would begin.

Since the September equinox, it had emerged from the northern horizon, rising by lengthened spirals up to the 21 December.

At this period, the summer solstice of the northern regions, it had begun to descend, and tomorrow was to shed its last rays upon them.

I communicated my fears and observations to Captain Nemo.

You are right, Monsieur Aranax, said he, if tomorrow I cannot take the altitude of the sun, I shall not be able to do it for six months.

But precisely because chance has led me into these seas on the 21 March, my bearings will be easy to take.

If at twelve we can see the sun.

Why, captain?

Because then the orb of day described such lengthened curves that it is difficult to measure exactly its height above the horizon.

And grave errors may be made with instruments.

What will you do then?

I shall only use my chronometer, replied Captain Nemo.

If tomorrow, the 21 March, the disk of the sun, allowing for refraction, is exactly cut by the northern horizon, it will show that I'm at the South Pole.

Just so, said I.

But this statement is not mathematically correct, because the equinox does not necessarily begin at noon.

Very likely, sir.

But the air will not be a hundred yards, and we do not want more.

Till tomorrow, then.

Captain Nemo returned on board conceal, and I remained to survey the shore, observing and studying, until 05:00.

Then I went to bed.

Not, however, without invoking, like the Indian, the favor of the radiant orb.

The next day, the 21 March, at five in the morning I mounted the platform.

I found Captain Nemo there.

The weather is lightning.

A little, said he.

I have some hope.

After breakfast we will go on shore and choose a post for observation.

That point settled.

I sought Ned land.

I wanted to take him with me, but the obstinate canadian refused, and I saw that his tass attorney and his bad humor grew day by day.

After all, I was not sorry for his obstinacy under the circumstances.

Indeed, there were too many seals on shore, and we ought not to lay such temptation in this unreflecting fisherman's way.

Breakfast over, we went on shore.

The nautilus had gone some miles further up in the night.

It was a whole league from the coast above, which reared a sharp peak about 500 yards high.

The boat took with me Captain Nemo, two men of the crew, and the instruments, which consisted of a chronometer, a telescope and a barometer.

While crossing, I saw numerous whales belonging to the three kinds peculiar to the southern seas.

The whale, or the english right whale, which has no dorsal fin, the humpback with reeved chest and large whitish fins, which in spite of its name, do not form wings, and the thin back of a yellowish brown, the liveliest of all the cetacea.

This powerful creature is heard a long way off, when he throws to a great height columns of air and vapor, which look like whirlwinds of smoke.

These different mammals were disporting themselves in troops in the quiet waters, and I could see that this basin of the antarctic poles serves as a place of refuge to the cetacea, too closely tracked by the hunters.

I also noticed large medusai floating between the reeds.

At nine we landed.

The sky was brightening, the clouds were flying to the south, and the fog seemed to be leaving the cold surface of the waters.

Captain Nemo went towards the peak, which he doubtless meant to be his observatory.

It was a painful ascent over the sharp lava and the pumice stones, in an atmosphere often impregnated with a sulfurous smell from the smoking cracks.

For a man unaccustomed to walk on land, the captain climbed the steep slopes with an agility I never saw equaled, and with which a hunter would have envied.

We were 2 hours getting to the summit of this peak, which was half porphyry and half basalt.

From thence we looked upon a vast sea, which towards the north distinctly traced its boundary line upon the sky.

At our feet lay fields of dazzling whiteness.

Over our heads a pale azure free from fog.

To the north, the disk of the sun seemed like a ball of fire already horned by the cutting of the horizon.

From the bosom of the water rose sheaves of liquid jets by hundreds.

In the distance lay the nautilus, like a cetacean asleep on the water.

Behind us, to the south and east, an immense country and a chaotic heap of rocks and ice, the limits of which were not visible.

On arriving at the summit, Captain Nemo carefully took the mean height of the barometer, for he would have to consider that in taking his observations at a quarter to twelve, the sun, then seen only by refraction, looked like a golden disk sheding its last rays upon this deserted continent and seas which never man had yet plowed.

Captain Nemo, furnished with a lenticular glass which, by means of a mirror, corrected the refraction, watched the orbs sinking below the horizon by degrees.

Following a lengthened diagonal, I held the chronometer.

My heart beat fast.

If the disappearance of the half disk of the sun coincided with 12:00 on the chronometer, we were at the pole itself.

Twelve.

I exclaimed.

The south pole, replied Captain Nemo in a grave voice, handing me the glass which showed the orb cut in exactly equal parts by the horizon.

I looked at the last rays crowning the peak and the shadows mounting by degrees up its slopes.

At that moment, Captain Nemo, resting with his hand on my shoulder, said, I, Captain Nemo, on this 21st day of March, 1868, have reached the south pole on the 19th degree, and I take possession of this part of the globe equal to one 6th of the known continents.

In whose name, captain?

In my own, sir, saying which, Captain Nemo unfurled a black banner bearing an inn in gold quartered on its bunting.

Then, turning towards the orb of day, whose last rays lapped the horizon of the sea, he exclaimed, adieu, son.

Disappear, thou radiant orb.

Rest beneath this open sea, and let a night of six months spread its shadows over my new domains.

Thank you for joining Byte at a time books today while we read a bite of one of your favorite classics.

Again, my name is Brie Carlyle, and I hope you come back tomorrow for the next bite of 20,000 leagues under the sea.

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