20,000 Leagues Under the Sea

Chapter 1 A Runaway Reef

Chapter 1 A

Runaway ReefTHE YEAR 1866 was marked by a bizarre development, an

unexplained and downright inexplicable phenomenon that surely no

one has forgotten. Without getting into those rumors that upset

civilians in the seaports and deranged the public mind even far

inland, it must be said that professional seamen were especially

alarmed. Traders, shipowners, captains of vessels, skippers, and

master mariners from Europe and America, naval officers from every

country, and at their heels the various national governments on

these two continents, were all extremely disturbed by the

business.

In essence, over a period of time several ships had encountered

"an enormous thing" at sea, a long spindle-shaped object, sometimes

giving off a phosphorescent glow, infinitely bigger and faster than

any whale.

The relevant data on this apparition, as recorded in various

logbooks, agreed pretty closely as to the structure of the object

or creature in question, its unprecedented speed of movement, its

startling locomotive power, and the unique vitality with which it

seemed to be gifted. If it was a cetacean, it exceeded in bulk any

whale previously classified by science. No naturalist, neither

Cuvier nor Lacépède, neither Professor

Dumeril nor Professor

de Quatrefages, would have accepted the existence of such a

monster sight unseen— specifically, unseen by their own scientific

eyes.

Striking an average of observations taken at different times—

rejecting those timid estimates that gave the object a length of

200 feet, and ignoring those exaggerated views that saw it as a

mile wide and three long—you could still assert that this

phenomenal creature greatly exceeded the dimensions of anything

then known to ichthyologists, if it existed at all.

Now then, it did exist, this was an undeniable fact; and since

the human mind dotes on objects of wonder, you can understand the

worldwide excitement caused by this unearthly apparition. As for

relegating it to the realm of fiction, that charge had to be

dropped.

In essence, on July 20, 1866, the steamer Governor Higginson,

from the Calcutta & Burnach Steam Navigation Co., encountered

this moving mass five miles off the eastern shores of

Australia.

Captain Baker at first thought he was in the presence of an

unknown reef; he was even about to fix its exact position when two

waterspouts shot out of this inexplicable object and sprang hissing

into the air some 150 feet. So, unless this reef was subject to the

intermittent eruptions of a geyser, the Governor Higginson had fair

and honest dealings with some aquatic mammal, until then unknown,

that could spurt from its blowholes waterspouts mixed with air and

steam.

Similar events were likewise observed in Pacific seas, on July

23 of the same year, by the Christopher Columbus from the West

India & Pacific Steam Navigation Co. Consequently, this

extraordinary cetacean could transfer itself from one locality to

another with startling swiftness, since within an interval of just

three days, the Governor Higginson and the Christopher Columbus had

observed it at two positions on the charts separated by a distance

of more than 700 nautical leagues.

Fifteen days later and 2,000 leagues farther, the Helvetia from

the Compagnie Nationale and the Shannon from the Royal Mail line,

running on opposite tacks in that part of the Atlantic lying

between the United States and Europe, respectively signaled each

other that the monster had been sighted in latitude 42 degrees 15'

north and longitude 60 degrees 35' west of the meridian of

Greenwich. From their simultaneous observations, they were able to

estimate the mammal's minimum length at more than 350 English

feet;[1] this was because both the Shannon and the

Helvetia were of smaller dimensions, although each measured 100

meters stem to stern. Now then, the biggest whales, those rorqual

whales that frequent the waterways of the Aleutian Islands, have

never exceeded a length of 56 meters—if they reach even that.

One after another, reports arrived that would profoundly affect

public opinion: new observations taken by the transatlantic liner

Pereire, the Inman line's Etna running afoul of the monster, an

official report drawn up by officers on the French frigate

Normandy, dead-earnest reckonings obtained by the general staff of

Commodore Fitz-James aboard the Lord Clyde. In lighthearted

countries, people joked about this phenomenon, but such serious,

practical countries as England, America, and Germany were deeply

concerned.

In every big city the monster was the latest rage; they sang

about it in the coffee houses, they ridiculed it in the newspapers,

they dramatized it in the theaters. The tabloids found it a fine

opportunity for hatching all sorts of hoaxes. In those newspapers

short of copy, you saw the reappearance of every gigantic imaginary

creature, from "Moby d**k," that

dreadful white whale from the High Arctic regions, to the

stupendous kraken whose tentacles could entwine a 500-ton craft and

drag it into the ocean depths. They even reprinted reports from

ancient times: the views of Aristotle and Pliny accepting

the existence of such monsters, then the Norwegian stories of

Bishop Pontoppidan, the narratives of Paul Egede, and finally the

reports of Captain Harrington— whose good faith is above

suspicion—in which he claims he saw, while aboard the Castilian in

1857, one of those enormous serpents that, until then, had

frequented only the seas of France's old extremist newspaper, The

Constitutionalist.

An interminable debate then broke out between believers and

skeptics in the scholarly societies and scientific journals. The

"monster question" inflamed all minds. During this memorable

campaign, journalists making a profession of science battled with

those making a profession of wit, spilling waves of ink and some of

them even two or three drops of blood, since they went from sea

serpents to the most offensive personal remarks.

For six months the war seesawed. With inexhaustible zest, the

popular press took potshots at feature articles from the Geographic

Institute of Brazil, the Royal Academy of Science in Berlin, the

British Association, the Smithsonian Institution in Washington,

D.C., at discussions in The Indian Archipelago, in Cosmos published

by Father Moigno, in Petermann's Mittheilungen,[2] and at

scientific chronicles in the great French and foreign newspapers.

When the monster's detractors cited a saying by the botanist

Linnaeus that "nature doesn't make leaps," witty writers in the

popular periodicals parodied it, maintaining in essence that

"nature doesn't make lunatics," and ordering their contemporaries

never to give the lie to nature by believing in krakens, sea

serpents, "Moby d***s," and other all-out efforts from drunken

seamen. Finally, in a much-feared satirical journal, an article by

its most popular columnist finished off the monster for good,

spurning it in the style of Hippolytus repulsing the amorous

advances of his stepmother Phaedra, and giving the creature its

quietus amid a universal burst of laughter. Wit had defeated

science.

During the first months of the year 1867, the question seemed to

be buried, and it didn't seem due for resurrection, when new facts

were brought to the public's attention. But now it was no longer an

issue of a scientific problem to be solved, but a quite real and

serious danger to be avoided. The question took an entirely new

turn. The monster again became an islet, rock, or reef, but a

runaway reef, unfixed and elusive.

On March 5, 1867, the Moravian from the Montreal Ocean Co.,

lying during the night in latitude 27 degrees 30' and longitude 72

degrees 15', ran its starboard quarter afoul of a rock marked on no

charts of these waterways. Under the combined efforts of wind and

400-horsepower steam, it was traveling at a speed of thirteen

knots. Without the high quality of its hull, the Moravian would

surely have split open from this collision and gone down together

with those 237 passengers it was bringing back from Canada.

This accident happened around five o'clock in the morning, just

as day was beginning to break. The officers on watch rushed to the

craft's stern. They examined the ocean with the most scrupulous

care. They saw nothing except a strong eddy breaking three cable

lengths out, as if those sheets of water had been violently

churned. The site's exact bearings were taken, and the Moravian

continued on course apparently undamaged. Had it run afoul of an

underwater rock or the wreckage of some enormous derelict ship?

They were unable to say. But when they examined its undersides in

the service yard, they discovered that part of its keel had been

smashed.

This occurrence, extremely serious in itself, might perhaps have

been forgotten like so many others, if three weeks later it hadn't

been reenacted under identical conditions. Only, thanks to the

nationality of the ship victimized by this new ramming, and thanks

to the reputation of the company to which this ship belonged, the

event caused an immense uproar.

No one is unaware of the name of that famous English

shipowner, Cunard. In 1840

this shrewd industrialist founded a postal service between

Liverpool and Halifax, featuring three wooden ships with

400-horsepower paddle wheels and a burden of 1,162 metric tons.

Eight years later, the company's assets were increased by four

650-horsepower ships at 1,820 metric tons, and in two more years,

by two other vessels of still greater power and tonnage. In 1853

the Cunard Co., whose mail-carrying charter had just been renewed,

successively added to its assets the Arabia, the Persia, the China,

the Scotia, the Java, and the Russia, all ships of top speed and,

after the Great Eastern, the biggest ever to plow the seas. So in

1867 this company owned twelve ships, eight with paddle wheels and

four with propellers.

If I give these highly condensed details, it is so everyone can

fully understand the importance of this maritime transportation

company, known the world over for its shrewd management. No

transoceanic navigational undertaking has been conducted with more

ability, no business dealings have been crowned with greater

success. In twenty-six years Cunard ships have made 2,000 Atlantic

crossings without so much as a voyage canceled, a delay recorded, a

man, a craft, or even a letter lost. Accordingly, despite strong

competition from France, passengers still choose the Cunard line in

preference to all others, as can be seen in a recent survey of

official documents. Given this, no one will be astonished at the

uproar provoked by this accident involving one of its finest

steamers.

On April 13, 1867, with a smooth sea and a moderate breeze, the

Scotia lay in longitude 15 degrees 12' and latitude 45 degrees 37'.

It was traveling at a speed of 13.43 knots under the thrust of its

1,000-horsepower engines. Its paddle wheels were churning the sea

with perfect steadiness. It was then drawing 6.7 meters of water

and displacing 6,624 cubic meters.

At 4:17 in the afternoon, during a high tea for passengers

gathered in the main lounge, a collision occurred, scarcely

noticeable on the whole, affecting the Scotia's hull in that

quarter a little astern of its port paddle wheel.

The Scotia hadn't run afoul of something, it had been fouled,

and by a cutting or perforating instrument rather than a blunt one.

This encounter seemed so minor that nobody on board would have been

disturbed by it, had it not been for the shouts of crewmen in the

hold, who climbed on deck yelling:

"We're sinking! We're sinking!"

At first the passengers were quite frightened, but Captain

Anderson hastened to reassure them. In fact, there could be no

immediate danger. Divided into seven compartments by watertight

bulkheads, the Scotia could brave any leak with impunity.

Captain Anderson immediately made his way into the hold. He

discovered that the fifth compartment had been invaded by the sea,

and the speed of this invasion proved that the leak was

considerable. Fortunately this compartment didn't contain the

boilers, because their furnaces would have been abruptly

extinguished.

Captain Anderson called an immediate halt, and one of his

sailors dived down to assess the damage. Within moments they had

located a hole two meters in width on the steamer's underside. Such

a leak could not be patched, and with its paddle wheels half

swamped, the Scotia had no choice but to continue its voyage. By

then it lay 300 miles from Cape Clear, and after three days of

delay that filled Liverpool with acute anxiety, it entered the

company docks.

The engineers then proceeded to inspect the Scotia, which had

been put in dry dock. They couldn't believe their eyes. Two and a

half meters below its waterline, there gaped a symmetrical gash in

the shape of an isosceles triangle. This breach in the sheet iron

was so perfectly formed, no punch could have done a cleaner job of

it. Consequently, it must have been produced by a perforating tool

of uncommon toughness— plus, after being launched with prodigious

power and then piercing four centimeters of sheet iron, this tool

had needed to withdraw itself by a backward motion truly

inexplicable.

This was the last straw, and it resulted in arousing public

passions all over again. Indeed, from this moment on, any maritime

casualty without an established cause was charged to the monster's

account. This outrageous animal had to shoulder responsibility for

all derelict vessels, whose numbers are unfortunately considerable,

since out of those 3,000 ships whose losses are recorded annually

at the marine insurance bureau, the figure for steam or sailing

ships supposedly lost with all hands, in the absence of any news,

amounts to at least 200!

Now then, justly or unjustly, it was the "monster" who stood

accused of their disappearance; and since, thanks to it, travel

between the various continents had become more and more dangerous,

the public spoke up and demanded straight out that, at all cost,

the seas be purged of this fearsome cetacean.