CHAPTER XVII.

VERTICAL DESCENT

Now began our real journey. Hitherto our toil had overcome all
difficulties, now difficulties would spring up at every step.

I had not yet ventured to look down the bottomless pit into which I
was about to take a plunge The supreme hour had come. I might now
either share in the enterprise or refuse to move forward. But I was
ashamed to recoil in the presence of the hunter. Hans accepted the
enterprise with such calmness, such indifference, such perfect
disregard of any possible danger that I blushed at the idea of being
less brave than he. If I had been alone I might have once more tried
the effect of argument; but in the presence of the guide I held my
peace; my heart flew back to my sweet Virlandaise, and I approached
the central chimney.

I have already mentioned that it was a hundred feet in diameter, and
three hundred feet round. I bent over a projecting rock and gazed
down. My hair stood on end with terror. The bewildering feeling of
vacuity laid hold upon me. I felt my centre of gravity shifting its
place, and giddiness mounting into my brain like drunkenness. There
is nothing more treacherous than this attraction down deep abysses. I
was just about to drop down, when a hand laid hold of me. It was that
of Hans. I suppose I had not taken as many lessons on gulf
exploration as I ought to have done in the Frelsers Kirk at
Copenhagen.

But, however short was my examination of this well, I had taken some
account of its conformation. Its almost perpendicular walls were
bristling with innumerable projections which would facilitate the
descent. But if there was no want of steps, still there was no rail.
A rope fastened to the edge of the aperture might have helped us
down. But how were we to unfasten it, when arrived at the other end?

My uncle employed a very simple expedient to obviate this difficulty.
He uncoiled a cord of the thickness of a finger, and four hundred
feet long; first he dropped half of it down, then he passed it round
a lava block that projected conveniently, and threw the other half
down the chimney. Each of us could then descend by holding with the
hand both halves of the rope, which would not be able to unroll
itself from its hold; when two hundred feet down, it would be easy to
get possession of the whole of the rope by letting one end go and
pulling down by the other. Then the exercise would go on again AD
INFINITUM.

"Now," said my uncle, after having completed these preparations, "now
let us look to our loads. I will divide them into three lots; each of
us will strap one upon his back. I mean only fragile articles."

Of course, we were not included under that head.

"Hans," said he, "will take charge of the tools and a portion of the
provisions; you, Axel, will take another third of the provisions, and
the arms; and I will take the rest of the provisions and the delicate
instruments."

"But," said I, "the clothes, and that mass of ladders and ropes, what
is to become of them?"

"They will go down by themselves."

"How so?" I asked.

"You will see presently."

My uncle was always willing to employ magnificent resources. Obeying
orders, Hans tied all the non-fragile articles in one bundle, corded
them firmly, and sent them bodily down the gulf before us.

I listened to the dull thuds of the descending bale. My uncle,
leaning over the abyss, followed the descent of the luggage with a
satisfied nod, and only rose erect when he had quite lost sight of it.

"Very well, now it is our turn."

Now I ask any sensible man if it was possible to hear those words
without a shudder.

The Professor fastened his package of instruments upon his shoulders;
Hans took the tools; I took the arms: and the descent commenced in
the following order; Hans, my uncle, and myself. It was effected in
profound silence, broken only by the descent of loosened stones down
the dark gulf.

I dropped as it were, frantically clutching the double cord with one
hand and buttressing myself from the wall with the other by means of
my stick. One idea overpowered me almost, fear lest the rock should
give way from which I was hanging. This cord seemed a fragile thing
for three persons to be suspended from. I made as little use of it as
possible, performing wonderful feats of equilibrium upon the lava
projections which my foot seemed to catch hold of like a hand.

When one of these slippery steps shook under the heavier form of
Hans, he said in his tranquil voice:

"GIF AKT! "

"Attention!" repeated my uncle.

In half an hour we were standing upon the surface of a rock jammed in
across the chimney from one side to the other.

Hans pulled the rope by one of its ends, the other rose in the air;
after passing the higher rock it came down again, bringing with it a
rather dangerous shower of bits of stone and lava.

Leaning over the edge of our narrow standing ground, I observed that
the bottom of the hole was still invisible.

The same maneuvre was repeated with the cord, and half an hour after
we had descended another two hundred feet.

I don't suppose the maddest geologist under such circumstances would
have studied the nature of the rocks that we were passing. I am sure
I did trouble my head about them. Pliocene, miocene, eocene,
cretaceous, jurassic, triassic, permian, carboniferous, devonian,
silurian, or primitive was all one to me. But the Professor, no
doubt, was pursuing his observations or taking notes, for in one of
our halts he said to me:

"The farther I go the more confidence I feel. The order of these
volcanic formations affords the strongest confirmation to the
theories of Davy. We are now among the primitive rocks, upon which
the chemical operations took place which are produced by the contact
of elementary bases of metals with water. I repudiate the notion of
central heat altogether. We shall see further proof of that very
soon."

No variation, always the same conclusion. Of course, I was not
inclined to argue. My silence was taken for consent and the descent
went on.

Another three hours, and I saw no bottom to the chimney yet. When I
lifted my head I perceived the gradual contraction of its aperture.
Its walls, by a gentle incline, were drawing closer to each other,
and it was beginning to grow darker.

Still we kept descending. It seemed to me that the falling stones
were meeting with an earlier resistance, and that the concussion gave
a more abrupt and deadened sound.

As I had taken care to keep an exact account of our maneuvres with
the rope, which I knew that we had repeated fourteen times, each
descent occupying half an hour, the conclusion was easy that we had
been seven hours, plus fourteen quarters of rest, making ten hours
and a half. We had started at one, it must therefore now be eleven
o'clock; and the depth to which we had descended was fourteen times
200 feet, or 2,800 feet.

At this moment I heard the voice of Hans.

"Halt!" he cried.

I stopped short just as I was going to place my feet upon my uncle's
head.

"We are there," he cried.

"Where?" said I, stepping near to him.

"At the bottom of the perpendicular chimney," he answered.

"Is there no way farther?"

"Yes; there is a sort of passage which inclines to the right. We will
see about that to-morrow. Let us have our supper, and go to sleep."

The darkness was not yet complete. The provision case was opened; we
refreshed ourselves, and went to sleep as well as we could upon a bed
of stones and lava fragments.

When lying on my back, I opened my eyes and saw a bright sparkling
point of light at the extremity of the gigantic tube 3,000 feet long,
now a vast telescope.

It was a star which, seen from this depth, had lost all
scintillation, and which by my computation should be 46; URSA
MINOR. Then I fell fast asleep.