Kitabı oku: «Perseverance Island», sayfa 18

Having gotten the submarine boat into the lake, I made a descent in it and examined the bottom. It was almost wholly of pure sand. The water varied from a depth of a few feet near the margin to about three fathoms near the centre. I saw several kinds of fish but none of large size. Having made this examination, I commenced upon the work before me of finding the gold. I went quite near to the mouth of Singing Water Brook, and descended and filled the tops of the tanks with sand from the bottom, failing to find any nuggets with the eye; but I afterwards found several in different trips, but never many or of very large size. Having loaded the boat, I arose to the surface, and beached her near the mouth of the brook, and landed my sand in baskets upon the shore. I then went to work with the pan and washed it in the mouth of the brook, and as the result of this one trip gathered together more gold-dust and small nuggets than I could hold in one hand. This was placer mining with a vengeance, the cream of all mining while it lasts. But I felt that I was going back-handed to work; so the next day, instead of coming on shore with my sand, I took the pan into the submarine boat, and as I pulled it up with a sort of long-handled shovel, washed it then and there in the water of the lake inside the submarine boat; but this again was, during a long day, tiring to my brain, as I had to keep renewing the air by rowing the boat ashore, for it was too shallow to use the air-boat, and I had long ago given up the idea of using the spray-wheel except in case of actual necessity, the air-boat superseding it.

Here I was in the ninth year of my captivity, working hard in my own gold-field. I worked nearly six months of this year, at all spare moments, in this manner, occasionally shovelling sand into the rocker on shore, which I procured from the edges of the lake near the mouth of the brook, just under water, and extracting the gold-dust by means of a belt from the steam yacht. I was quite successful with this method also, but the largest quantity of the dust had evidently been for ages swept into the lake opposite the mouth of Singing Water Brook. I also ascended the brook several times during these months, till it led me to a mountain of some eminence, where it ended in little branches that tumbled down its side.

I got "signs" of gold often, – in fact almost always at the eddies of this brook, and even in its branches, – but never in as large quantities as in the sand at the mouth, although I obtained one very large nugget in the sands of a quiet pool fully half a mile from the lake. I also ascertained that the mountain was composed mostly of quartz, – which miners term the mother of gold, – and all the little pebbles that I picked up in the running brooks were of this description, several of them being prettily marked with little veins of gold. There was no doubt whence the gold came; it had been pouring down from this mountain side in these small trickling streams for centuries, veining the pieces of quartz that contained it till the latter, by friction and water, deposited itself in the shape of sand, and the released gold as dust or nuggets, at the mouth of the brook, having been, perhaps, centuries making the descent from the mountain side to the lake, a distance perhaps of one mile. I knew perfectly well that the mountain contained the inexhaustible mine from which this precious dust escaped, but I also knew that without quicksilver it was beyond my reach to gather it. For in quartz-mining I should need iron stamps, fuel, steam-engine, amalgamator, rocking-table, etc., all of which I could supply, perhaps, except the quicksilver; but this troubled me very little, for I knew that there was more gold at the mouth of the lake than I could gather in perhaps a lifetime, unless I could invent some way to come at it more convenient than the ways that I was now employing. I had often, at the end of a day's work, at this time, nearly as much gold-dust as I could hold in my two hands, much more than one handful, and in value, of which I could only guess, at least $200 to $250. After getting quite a quantity together, – say a week's work, – I used to transport it to the Hermitage, take it to the workshop, smelt it, and preserve the button by burying it within the enclosure of the Hermitage.

I had at the end of some six months become greedy and was not satisfied with my daily gains, but longed to extend my operations. During these months I had not been idle, but had studied upon the problem of how to get at the bottom of the lake. I was thinking about this one day, when nearly half-way between the lake and the mountain side, passing the brook once in a while and looking into its waters for quartz-pebbles marked with gold. At once it struck me, why not turn the brook from the lake towards the sea, in a new direction. I struck my head with my fist to think what a fool I had been for so many months; why, here, even where I stood, was a natural valley on my left, that would convey the water to the sea. I dashed down my pan and worked my way seaward. Why here was even a little mountain brook already tending in that direction, and, following it about two miles, I saw it pierce the sand of the seaside, at least two feet wide, and discharge its tiny current into the ocean. I was crazy with excitement. I dashed back again to the point where I had left my pan, and, picking it up, made for the lake. When I arrived, I went to the inlet and examined it. I felt that I had the whole matter under my thumb, and without much labor, too; for if I should turn the direction of Singing Water Brook so that it would not pour into Mirror Lake, the latter at its outlet would be exactly as low as the bottom, over which a rapid current was now flowing, but which would, by this process, be in one sense brought to the surface; and, as it appeared, I could work upon it, and cut it down, and as I cut it down so would the lake be drawn off, till, if cut little by little, a passage-way which I could timber up to the depth of eighteen feet, all the water of the lake would be drawn off, and the whole bottom exposed to my view, and the golden accumulation of untold ages beneath my feet to pick and choose from. It was feasible, fool that I was, not to have thought of it before. The very next day, armed with axes, tools, and shovels, which I had to make two trips to convey, I found myself at the place on the brook where the natural valley leading towards the sea seemed to meet it, and where a little further on to the seaward I had found the miniature brook, trickling its way to the southward. At the point that I commenced work the brook was not over ten or twelve feet wide, rapid to be sure, but with not a very great descent just at this point. I commenced in the first place by cutting and opening on its southerly bank, towards the sea and into the valley. I did not cut the bank away so as to let the water in yet to its new channel, but worked a little distance from it. For two whole weeks I dug at this, making a good bed for the brook to rush into in its new passage that I intended to give it to the sea. Having this to suit me, I commenced cutting down trees to fall across the brook as it now ran, and these I filled in with pebbles and stones. It was hard work, but at the end of three weeks I had made such a dam across the original brook that I opened the passage for the water into the new one, and kept on strengthening the former till all the water in a day or two bounded down its new course to the sea as if it had always run in that direction. I restrained my curiosity, however, to look for gold in the now dried up bed of the brook, but felled more trees, and put in more stones, and banked up with more earth, till I felt convinced that even in a storm the brook would no longer seek an outlet in the direction of the lake over such a barrier, and with the bed of its new course so well dug out by itself even now, helped as it had been by my labor of two weeks, before allowing it to seek it. Finally I felt my work complete, and, breaking up my camp that I had so long made in the woods, I went back to the lake, looking once in a while into the now empty brook. I should have said that of course, before I undertook this work, I had taken the yacht and submarine boat out of the way, – the submarine boat to its old resting-place at Still Water Cove, and the yacht at anchor in Mirror Bay near the shore. I had been living a hard, rude life in the woods, and had only come out once to go to the Hermitage for food and to attend to my flocks; and I hurried down now to look at the lake, which I knew would be lowered to exactly the former depth of the water at the outlet, some four or five feet. As I came in view of it I saw at once the effects of my work; it looked already woefully shrunken and belittled, but I did not stop to look at it, or for nuggets either. I felt convinced that I had passed many in the bed of the deserted brook, but at present I was intent upon my work of changing the face of nature. In two trips I had all my traps and tools conveyed to the outlet, and it was here that I established my new camp. I had to go to the saw-mill and get some plank, and by the aid of the goats and wagon finally, after bringing them around in the yacht, got them to the outlet where I needed them. I commenced digging in its bed, and the water soon began to pour out, as I did not have to dig a great distance, as the decline was quite sharp. I found that I should not need my boards till I had gotten considerably down, if even then, for my work consisted only in shovelling the bed of the late stream out upon each side and in making a channel lower than the water still remaining in the lake. Suffice it to say that in three months I had the lake drawn off, so as to expose a very large margin of the late bottom. It would take too long to relate how I travelled over these exposed sands and the deserted bed of Singing Water Brook; it will be sufficient to say that my findings were immense, and in the bed of the brook I found several nuggets in what had before been eddies, weighing as high as two or three pounds, as near as I could judge. I soon, however, got tired of tramping over the sand to try and find nuggets by the eye, and arranged to go to work in a more thorough and satisfactory manner. To do this, I left my gold-fields for several months, and went to work at my forge to turn out a portable steam-engine, with a rocker or sand-washer attached. When this was finished I took it, in pieces, to the bed of the lake and erected it on wheels. It was arranged with sections of pipe and hose so as to be placed near the sand that was to be washed, and the water pumped for that purpose from that still remaining in the lake, and which I had left for this very purpose, intending to draw it off and expose more bottom by opening the outlet whenever I should have been over the sands now exposed to view. It was well also that I should have had to make this engine, for the fishes contained in the lake had commenced to die, and the air was impregnated with their effluvia, and the surface was covered with their dead bodies. When I got to work with my rocker and engine it seemed as if the sands were inexhaustible. I often gathered, as far as I could judge, in one day's work, the sum of at least $500, and some days I must have gathered hard upon $1,000, not to mention the nuggets large enough to pick up with my hand, that I was continually coming upon. But at last I got absolutely tired of gathering this golden harvest, and abandoned it for other occupations, having already more than I knew what to do with, and of not one dollar's value to me unless I could escape or be rescued. After my fierce excitement was over in this direction, I returned to the old problem of escape.

CHAPTER XXVIII

The sea serpent. Attack and capture one of the species, thus putting the question of its existence forever at rest.

It was in my tenth year of captivity that the following adventure occurred to me, which is of such importance to the scientific world, and settles forever such a disputed question, that I cannot forbear to relate it here in the interest of science, and to set at rest all doubts upon this subject forever.

I had started upon one of my trips to the pearl oyster reef in the submarine boat, to obtain some of those bivalves, to convey to the shore for examination. The day was beautiful, and the sky clear and almost without a cloud, with a light air moving from the northwest. I was standing out toward the reef from Perseverance Bay with the manhole open, and all goat power on, when all at once, as I was gazing about the horizon, I saw to leeward of me and off the eastern end of the island, a strange commotion in the regular waves of the ocean. Some animal or fish was evidently splashing the water about into the air in huge quantities. At one time it looked as if the disturbance was caused by porpoises disporting themselves in their native element, and following their leader, in a long string; but I soon saw this was not the case. At another moment it seemed as if a whole fleet of empty barrels had been suddenly left bobbing about in mid-ocean, and then again as if detached quantities of dry seaweed had been floated seaward by the tide, and showed itself as it rose and fell upon the summits of different waves. Whilst the object was taking all these different shapes to my gazing eyes, I was steadily approaching it, having changed the course of the boat, and as I advanced I found that it also was coming towards me, and when within perhaps one half mile, the creature (for it proved to be an animal), suddenly raised its head at least twenty feet above the waves of the ocean, and looked about him in every direction. At once the truth flashed upon me. Here was in verity the sea serpent of which so much has been written and so much doubted. There was no deception; all was too plain before me to deceive a child: but, to prove the matter beyond doubt, I stopped the boat and waited for his near approach. He happened to be heading so that he would naturally pass very near to me, and I got ready to clap down the manhole and descend into the ocean if he made any attack upon me. Just as he was coming along finely towards me, he suddenly plunged beneath the surface and was lost to view. Here was a pretty ending to all my desires to observe him. He had not as yet come near enough for me to describe him, so as to be believed. What should I do? I hated to lose him in this manner, and I felt confident that he had sounded, not on account of perceiving my boat, which he could have scarcely noticed, but, because he was at that moment in the humor or was feeding. Whilst I was uttering useless regrets at having lost him, and making up my mind whether or not to descend myself and try to find him, I was disturbed by a loud splash astern of where I was looking, and, facing about, I looked into the eyes of the horrible creature, not forty yards distant from me.

He did not, however, seem to notice me in the least, but to clap down the manhole cover and descend was with me the work of a moment, for I knew too little of his habits to trust him. I have perhaps before in this narrative stated that, when beneath the surface of the water, all fishes and animals seemed not to take the slightest notice of me; either taking my boat for a submarine rock, or else for a creature like themselves; why it was so, I, of course, cannot say, but that such was the fact I can aver. I had often put my hand down into the water upon the back of quite large fish, when beneath the surface, and it was not till they were touched that they seemed to know that anything out of the ordinary was happening. I had been fully as near the sea serpent as I desired, and descended for safety; his horrible eyes and face haunting me as I fell slowly towards the bottom. Having arrived to within ten or twelve feet, I checked the boat, intending to wait a reasonable time for his lordship to depart, and then to rise to the surface and go on my way rejoicing that he had not injured me; but I had not remained more than five minutes in my position before I saw a sight that frightened me more than meeting this creature on the surface; for, glancing about towards the bottom, my eyes fell upon the serpent making his descent from above, and moving along slowly on the bottom, evidently seeking for his prey. His horrible head passed within at least ten feet of the boat, of which he seemed to take not the slightest notice. As it passed from my view it was followed by the body, at least one hundred feet in length, and as large around as a common-sized flour barrel. I was too startled to move, but kept the boat quietly in position till the whole body passed slowly out of sight. As the tail went by me, my first impulse was to get out of the way, and ascend to the surface, and start for home; my next was to remain where I was and see what would happen. Sitting down, I thought the whole matter over. My solitary existence had given me an inordinate appetite for excitement. I wanted something to stir my stagnant blood, something to call into action all my physical and mental powers. You who have never been cut off from the rest of mankind cannot credit this thirst for something new, something moving, something strange. The daily conversation, the crowded streets, the incidents of life, feed this desire and keep it satisfied; but when there is nothing of this kind, the mind and body both ache to fill the void produced. Add to this such a temperament as mine, and it can be understood that, just saved from an attack from this unknown monster, I determined to attack him, and, if possible, capture him. I don't know why I should have brought myself to this conclusion, or why I should risk my life, but such is man. From a state of fear I entered into one of fierce excitement, and made every preparation to attack the danger I had just escaped.

I had always with me in the boat, two strong, sharp harpoons with long, seasoned, wooden staffs, in complete order, and also a lance and knife. To the harpoons was attached a raw-hide rope, some fifty fathoms in length, and with this I made up my mind to strike the serpent if I could get the chance. To the end of the raw-hide rope, I attached a wooden buoy, and, thus armed, I started the goats, and headed the boat in the direction the monster had taken but a few moments before, and in such a leisurely manner. I had not gone far before I saw the end of his tail coming in view, as he lay stretched upon the sandy bottom. I lowered the boat till I floated about eight feet above the hidden form, and, plucking up my courage, steered forward over him, with his huge body for a guide. As I arrived near his head I stopped the goats, and let the boat drift, the tide luckily being in the direction that I desired to go, that is, what there was of it, which was very little. As the head came slowly into view, I saw that the monster was engaged in quietly crunching in his horrible jaws a fish of some size, that he had evidently just caught, and, upon which his attention seemed to be fixed. The moment was propitious, and, as the boat slowly drifted, not eight feet over the head of the terrible creature, I stood with the harpoon in my hand, and deliberately drove it downward with all my might through his head, just abaft the eyes.

I did not stop to see the effect of my blow, but immediately tumbled into the water, as fast as possible, several of the large stones that I used on the shelves for ballast, so as to ascend at once towards the surface, casting overboard at the same time the line attached to the harpoon, with the buoy at the end. Relieved of the ballast, the boat commenced to ascend instantly and rapidly, but none too soon, for, as it was rushing towards the surface, just below me came the sweep of the creature's terrible tail in its death agony. If I had been struck with it, it would inevitably have capsized my boat, and perhaps have killed me, or, at least, left me to swim ashore to the island, distant some miles, or else be drowned; but, luckily, the blow missed me; the ascent of the boat was so rapid, the very moment I kicked and threw over some of the ballast. Having risen as near the surface as possible, I rigged my pump and ascended still further, and then, setting up my tripod and shipping my air-boat, I soon had air enough to rise completely above the surface, and to open the manhole and look about me. Of course, my first glance was to discover my buoy. Yes; there it lay, not fifty yards from me, without any motion, except what it received from the waves upon which it floated. I could hardly credit that at the other end lay the sea monster, transfixed through the brain with my trusty harpoon; but such, I felt sure, was the case. The mark had been too near and quiet for me to fail, and I had with my own eyes seen the iron driven in up to the staff through the centre of its head. I longed to find out the state of affairs, but did not dare to descend for fear of being caught in the folds of the dying monster. I steered for the floating buoy, and, getting hold of it, by means of a boat-hook thrust out of the manhole, I pulled it towards me, and gathered in all the slack line, till I could feel that I was pulling direct upon the harpoon. No vibration came to me through it, and I could slightly raise the weight evidently attached to the other end, but I was afraid of possibly drawing out the harpoon, so I did not attempt much in this direction; but, being assured that the creature was dead, I finally mustered up courage to descend and look at him. As I came near the bottom, I stopped the boat and advanced in the direction that the line from the buoy trended in. Yes, there he was, dead as a door-nail; but his whole body, that had so lately been stretched along the bottom, was coiled up and around the staff of the harpoon, which had pinned the head to the ocean's bed. I came near enough to see that the creature was really dead, and then, rising to the surface, I made all haste for Stillwater Cove. Arriving, I got up steam on the yacht, and made all haste back to the buoy, towing the submarine boat behind me. When I got upon the ground, I descended in the submarine boat, and, by means of ropes, and pulling and hauling in each direction, I got the body of the serpent somewhat straightened out and the head clear. Around the neck I fastened a good, strong, rawhide rope and attached the buoy rope to it. I then, at a distance of some thirty or forty feet from the head, lashed to the back of the creature my air-boat, to sustain that part somewhat, so that it would not drag upon the bottom. I then arose to the surface and went on board of the yacht, and took the buoy rope to the balance-wheel in the engine-room, and hove the head of the monster nearly to the surface; the water sustaining it, so that it was not very heavy. I trusted to my air-boat to help sustain the remainder of the body, and, thus accoutred, with the submarine boat towing far astern out of the way, I headed slowly for Stillwater Cove, towing my prey behind me. When I arrived at the opening of the cove I drew the carcase as far as possible, by means of the steam yacht, on to the sandy seashore, where the tide would leave it out of water when it receded. I then liberated my goats, and moored the boat in the harbor near by, and, taking my pets on board, after anchoring the serpent safely, steamed towards the Hermitage, where I landed them, and took on board some empty barrels and knives, hatchets, and saws, to dissect my sea monster. When I arrived back the sea had already fallen so as to leave the head and at least twenty feet of the body high and dry. After the tide had wholly gone down, I measured the monster, and these were the dimensions. Taking my measure of a fathom as a standard, the creature was twenty-two and one-half fathoms long, and, at its largest girth – about two fathoms below the neck – over one fathom and a quarter in circumference. It is difficult to describe the monster, but I will try. The head was at least eight feet long, and the extent to which the mouth could be opened over six feet; the gullet was small; the teeth numerous, but small; the nostrils large and prominent; the eyes fully six inches in diameter, and with an expression that, even now that the creature was dead, I could not stand when I looked into them. In the stomach I found only small pieces of different kind of fishes, and, by the smallness of the teeth and gullet, I am inclined to believe that the creature is naturally quite harmless, like most of the mighty animals of the earth, – as the sperm whale, elephant, etc., which never attack anyone unless disturbed. Beyond the head, and, for a distance of some ten feet, grew a sort of mane, formed of pendant tissues of flesh some five or six feet in length, exactly like those to be found on the sides of the mouth of the Mississippi cat-fish or smaller horn-pout. Towards the tail, and some distance from it, was an adipose fin, that was at least a foot high and fifteen feet long. The skin of the creature was of a mottled greenish hue, rough, and discolored, something the color of the shell of a very young crab, and at least a good quarter of an inch in thickness. Having taken all the dimensions of the monster, I went to work and cut off his head, and left it purposely where the fishes, lobsters, etc., would feed upon it at high water, so as to in time preserve its skeleton when all the bones were completely articulated. The remainder of the body I skinned in sections, at different times, and was glad to roll the rest of the body into the current of Stillwater Cove, to be carried out to sea.

I have enough on hand, at the time of writing this, to prove to any one that I have both seen and captured the veritable sea serpent; for, as I sit in the Hermitage, the whole skull, with jaws, teeth, and part of the vertebræ attached, is hung up near me, and below it a circular piece, nearly four feet long, of the hide of the animal at its greatest girth. The frontal bone of the skull, which is not very thick, is broken where the harpoon iron entered and caused immediate death. With this exception the whole specimen is in complete order; and I have also a sketch of the animal drawn upon parchment, from actual life, taken by myself before he was at all mutilated or cut up.

I hope that this truthful, consistent, and convincing recital will close forever this mooted question; for there is a sea serpent, and I have been able to capture and preserve one of his species.