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Mysterious Island - Shipwrecked in the Air

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<h2>CHAPTER XX.</h2> THE RAINY SEASON—WHAT TO WEAR-A SEAL-HUNT—CANDLE-MAKING—-WORK IN THE GRANITE HOUSE—THE TWO CAUSEWAYS—RETURN FROM A VISIT TO THE OYSTER-BED—WHAT HERBERT FOUND IS HIS POCKET. The winter season began in earnest with the month of June, which corresponded with December in our northern hemisphere. Showers and storms succeeded each other without an intermission, and the inmates of the Granite House could appreciate the advantages of a dwelling impervious to the weather. The Chimneys would indeed have proved a miserable shelter against the inclemency of the winter; they feared even lest the high tides driven by the sea-wind should pour in and destroy their furnaces and their foundry. All this month of June was occupied with various labors, which left plenty of time for hunting and fishing, so that the reserve stock of food was constantly kept up. Pencroff intended, as soon as he had time, to set traps, from which he expected great results. He had made snares of ligneous fibre, and not a day passed but some rodent was captured from the warren. Neb spent all his time in smoking and salting meat. The question of clothes now came up for serious discussion. The colonists had no other garments than those which they wore when the balloon cast them on shore. These, fortunately, were warm and substantial; and by dint of extreme care, even their linen had been kept clean and whole; but everything would soon wear out, and moreover, during a vigorous winter, they would suffer severely from cold. Here Smith was fairly baffled. He had been occupied in providing for their most urgent wants, food and shelter, and the winter was upon them before the clothes problem could be solved. They must resign themselves to bear the cold with fortitude, and when the dry season returned would undertake a great hunt of the moufflons, which they had seen on Mount Franklin, and whose wool the engineer could surely make into warm thick cloth. He would think over the method. “Well, we must toast ourselves before the fire!” said Pencroff.” There’s plenty of fire wood, no reason for sparing it.” “Besides,” added Spilett, “Lincoln Island is not in very high latitude, and the winters are probably mild. Did you not say, Cyrus that the thirty-fifth parallel corresponded with that of Spain in the other hemisphere?” “Yes,” said the engineer, “but the winter in Spain is sometimes very cold, with snow and ice, and we may have a hard time of it. Still we are on an island, and have a good chance for more moderate weather.” “Why, Mr. Smith?” said Herbert. “Because the sea, my boy, may be considered as an immense reservoir, in which the summer heat lies stored. At the coming of winter this heat is again given out, so that the neighboring regions have always a medium temperature, cooler in summer and warmer in winter.” “We shall see,” said Pencroff. “I am not going to bother myself about the weather. One thing is certain, the days are getting short already and the evenings long. Suppose we talk a little about candles.” “Nothing is easier,” said Smith. “To talk about?” asked the sailor. “To make.” “And when shall we begin?” “To-morrow, by a seal-hunt.” “What! to make dips?” “No, indeed, Pencroff, candles.” Such was the engineer’s project, which was feasible enough, as he had lime and sulphuric acid, and as the amphibia of the island would furnish the necessary fat. It was now June 4, and Pentecost Sunday, which they kept as a day of rest and thanksgiving. They were no longer miserable castaways, they were colonists. On the next day, June 5, they started for the islet. They had to choose the time of low tide to ford the channel; and all determined that, somehow or other, they must build a boat which would give them easy communication with all parts of the island, and would enable them to go up the Mercy, when they should undertake that grand exploration of the southwestern district which they had reserved for the first good weather. Seals were numerous, and the hunters, armed with their iron-spiked spears, easily killed half a dozen of them, which Neb and Pencroff skinned. Only the hides and fat were carried back to Granite House, the former to be made into shoes. The result of the hunt was about 300 pounds of fat, every pound of which could be used in making candles. The operation was simple enough, and the product, if not the best of its kind, was all they needed. Had Smith had at his disposition nothing but sulphuric acid, he could, by heating this acid with neutral fats, such as the fat of the seal, separate the glycerine, which again could be resolved, by means of boiling water, into oleine, margarine, and stearine. But, to simplify the operation, he preferred to saponify the fat by lime. He thus obtained a calcareous soap, easily decomposed by sulphuric acid, which precipitated the lime as a sulphate, and freed the fatty acids. The first of these three acids (oleine, margarine, and stearine) was a liquid which he expelled by pressure. The other two formed the raw material of the candles. In twenty-four hours the work was done. Wicks were made, after some unsuccessful attempts, from vegetable fibre, and were steeped in the liquified compound. They were real stearine candles, made by hand, white and smooth. During all this month work was going on inside their new abode. There was plenty of carpenter’s work to do. They improved and completed their tools, which were very rudimentary. Scissors were made, among other things, so that they were able to cut their hair, and, if not actually to shave their beards, at least to trim them to their liking. Herbert had no beard, and Neb none to speak of, but the others found ample employment for the scissors. They had infinite trouble in making a hand-saw; but at last succeeded in shaping an instrument which would cut wood by a rigorous application. Then they made tables, chairs and cupboards to furnish the principal rooms, and the frames of beds whose only bedding was mattrasses of wrack-grass. The kitchen, with its shelves, on which lay the terra-cotta utensils, its brick furnace, and its washing-stone, looked very comfortable, and Neb cooked with the gravity of a chemist in his laboratory. But joiners work had to give place to carpentry. The new weir created by the explosion rendered necessary the construction of two causeways, one upon Prospect Plateau, the other on the shore itself. Now the plateau and the coast were transversely cut by a water-course which the colonists had to cross when ever they wished to reach the northern part of the island. To avoid this they had to make a considerable detour, and to walk westward as far as the sources of Red creek. Their best plan therefore was to build two causeways, one on the plateau and one on the shore, twenty to twenty-five feet long, simply constructed of trees squared by the axe. This was the work of some days. When these bridges had been built, Neb and Pencroff profited by them to go to the oyster-bed which had been discovered off the down. They dragged after them a sort of rough cart which had taken the place of the inconvenient hurdle; and they brought back several thousand oysters, which, were readily acclimated among the rocks, and formed a natural preserve at the mouth of the Mercy. They were excellent of their kind, and formed an almost daily article of diet. In fact, Lincoln Island, though the colonists had explored but a small portion of it, already supplied nearly all their wants, while it seemed likely that a minute exploration of the western forests would reveal a world of new treasures. Only one privation still distressed the colonists. Azotic food they had in plenty, and the vegetables which corrected it; from the ligneous roots of the dragon-trees, submitted to fermentation, they obtained a sort of acidulated beer. They had even made sugar, without sugar-cane or beet-root, by collecting the juice which distills from the “acer saccharinum,” a sort of maple which flourishes in all parts of the temperate zone, and which abounded on the island. They made a very pleasant tea from the plant brought from the warren; and, finally, they had plenty of salt, the only mineral component necessary to food—but bread was still to seek. Perhaps, at some future time, they would have been able to replace this aliment by some equivalent, sago flour, or the breadfruit tree, which they might possibly have discovered in the woods of the southwest; but so far they had not met with them. Just at this time a little incident occurred which brought about what Smith, with all his ingenuity, could not have achieved. One rainy day the colonists were together in the large hall of Granite House, when Herbert suddenly cried, “See, Mr. Smith, a grain of corn.” And he showed his companions a single gram which had got into the lining of his waistcoat through a hole in his pocket. Pencroff had given him some ring-doves in Richmond, and in feeding them one of the grains had remained in his pocket. “A grain of corn?” said the engineer, quickly. “Yes, sir; but only one.” “That’s a wonderful help,” said Pencroff, laughing. “The bread that grain will make will never choke us.” Herbert was about to throw away the grain, when Cyrus Smith took it, examined it, found that it was in good condition, and said quietly to the sailor:— “Pencroff, do you know how many ears of corn will spring from one grain?” “One, I suppose,” said the sailor, surprised at the question. “Ten, Pencroff. And how many grains are there to an ear?” “Faith, I don’t know.” “Eighty on an average,” said Smith. “So then, if we plant this grain, we shall get from it a harvest of 800 grains; from them in the second year 640,000; in the third, 512,000,000; in the fourth, more than 400,000,000,000. That is the proportion.” His companions listened in silence. The figures stupefied them. “Yes, my friend,” resumed the engineer. “Such is the increase of Nature. And what is even this multiplication of a grain of corn whose ears have only 800 grains, compared with the poppy plant, which has 32,000 seeds, or the tobacco plant, which has 360,000? In a few years, but for the numerous enemies which destroy them, these plants would cover the earth. And now, Pencroff,” he resumed, “do you know how many bushels there are in 400,000,000,000 grains?” “No,” answered the sailor, “I only know that I am an idiot!” “Well, there will be more than 3,000,000, at 130,000 the bushel!” “Three millions!” cried Pencroff. “Three millions.” “In four years?” “Yes,” said Smith, “and even in two, if, as I hope, we can get two harvests a year in this latitude.” Pencroff answered with a tremendous hurrah. “So, Herbert,” added the engineer, “your discovery is of immense importance. Remember, my friends, that everything may be of use to us in our present situation.” “Indeed, Mr. Smith, I will remember it,” said Pencroff, “and if ever I find one of those grains of tobacco which increase 360,000 times, I’ll take care not to throw it away. And now what must we do?” “We must plant this grain,” said Herbert. “Yes,” added Spilett, “and with the greatest care, for upon it depend our future harvests!” “Provided that it grows,” said the sailor. “It will grow,” answered Smith. It was now the 20th of June, a good time for planting the precious grain. They thought at first of planting it in a pot; but upon consideration, they determined to trust it frankly to the soil. The same day it was planted, with the greatest precaution. The weather clearing a little, they walked up to the plateau above Granite House, and chose there a spot well sheltered from the wind, and exposed to the midday fervor of the sun. This spot was cleared, weeded, and even dug, so as to destroy insects and worms; it was covered with a layer of fresh earth, enriched with a little lime; a palissade was built around it, and then the grain was covered up in its moist bed. They seemed to be laying the corner-stone of an edifice. Pencroff was reminded of the extreme care with which they had lighted their only match; but this was a more serious matter. The castaways could always have succeeded in obtaining fire by some means or other; but no earthly power could restore that grain of corn, if, by ill fortune, it should perish! <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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