Jules Verne - The Essential Jules Verne - 29 Greatest Sci-Fi & Adventure Books in One Edition

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Musaicum Books presents to you this carefully created volume of «THE ESSENTIAL JULES VERNE: 29 Greatest Sci-Fi & Adventure Books in One Edition». This ebook has been designed and formatted to the highest digital standards and adjusted for readability on all devices.
Contents:
Five Weeks In A Balloon – 1863
A Journey To The Center Of The Earth – 1864
The Adventures Of Captain Hatteras – 1864
From The Earth To The Moon – 1865
In Search Of The Castaways – 1865
20,000 Leagues Under The Sea – 1869
Around The Moon – 1869
Around The World In Eighty Days – 1872
The Fur Country – 1872
The Mysterious Island – 1874
The Survivors Of The Chancellor – 1874
Michael Strogoff – 1876
Off On A Comet – 1877
The Underground City (or The Child of the Cavern) – 1877
Dick Sand, A Captain at Fifteen – 1878
Eight Hundred Leagues On The Amazon – 1881
Godfrey Morgan – 1882
Robur The Conqueror – 1886
The Purchase of the North Pole (or Topsy-Turvy) – 1889
The Adventures Of A Special Correspondent (or Claudius Bombarnac) – 1893
Facing The Flag – 1896
An Antarctic Mystery – 1897
The Master Of The World – 1904
Novellas & Stories:
A Voyage In A Balloon (Or A Drama In The Air) – 1851
Master Zacharius Or The Clockmaker Who Lost His Soul – 1854
A Winter Amid The Ice – 1855
The Blockade Runners – 1871
Doctor Ox's Experiment (Or A Fantasy Of Dr Ox) – 1872
In The Year 2889 – 1889
ules Verne (1828-1905) was a French novelist who pioneered the genre of science fiction. A true visionary with an extraordinary talent for writing adventure stories, his writings incorporated the latest scientific knowledge of his day and envisioned technological developments that were years ahead of their time. Verne wrote about undersea, air, and space travel long before any navigable or practical craft were invented. Verne wrote over 50 novels and numerous short stories.

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CHAPTER II THE THREE DOCUMENTS

Table of Contents

ALL that could be discovered, however, on these pieces of paper was a few words here and there, the remainder of the lines being almost completely obliterated by the action of the water. Lord Glenarvan examined them attentively for a few minutes, turning them over on all sides, holding them up to the light, and trying to decipher the least scrap of writing, while the others looked on with anxious eyes. At last he said: “There are three distinct documents here, apparently copies of the same document in three different languages. Here is one in English, one in French, and one in German.”

“But can you make any sense out of them?” asked Lady Helena.

“That’s hard to say, my dear Helena, the words are quite incomplete.”

“Perhaps the one may supplement the other,” suggested Major McNabbs.

“Very likely they will,” said the captain. “It is impossible that the very same words should have been effaced in each document, and by putting the scraps together we might gather some intelligible meaning out of them.”

“That’s what we will do,” rejoined Lord Glenarvan; “but let us proceed methodically. Here is the English document first.”

All that remained of it was the following:

62 Bri gow sink stra aland skipp Gr that monit of long and ssistance lost

“There’s not much to be made out of that,” said the Major, looking disappointed.

“No, but it is good English anyhow,” returned the captain.

“There’s no doubt of it,” said Glenarvan. “The words SINK, ALAND, LOST are entire; SKIPP is evidently part of the word SKIPPER, and that’s what they call ship captains often in England. There seems a Mr. Gr. mentioned, and that most likely is the captain of the shipwrecked vessel.”

“Well, come, we have made out a good deal already,” said Lady Helena.

“Yes, but unfortunately there are whole lines wanting,” said the Major, “and we have neither the name of the ship nor the place where she was shipwrecked.”

“We’ll get that by and by,” said Edward.

“Oh, yes; there is no doubt of it,” replied the Major, who always echoed his neighbor’s opinion. “But how?”

“By comparing one document with the other.”

“Let us try them,” said his wife.

The second piece of paper was even more destroyed than the first; only a few scattered words remained here and there.

It ran as follows:

7 Juni Glas zwei atrosen graus bringt ihnen

“This is written in German,” said John Mangles the moment he looked at it.

“And you understand that language, don’t you?” asked Lord Glenarvan.

“Perfectly.”

“Come, then, tell us the meaning of these words.”

The captain examined the document carefully, and said:

“Well, here’s the date of the occurrence first: 7 Juni means June 7; and if we put that before the figures 62 we have in the other document, it gives us the exact date, 7th of June, 1862.”

“Capital!” exclaimed Lady Helena. “Go on, John!”

“On the same line,” resumed the young captain, “there is the syllable GLAS and if we add that to the GOW we found in the English paper, we get the whole word GLASGOW at once. The documents evidently refer to some ship that sailed out of the port of Glasgow.” “That is my opinion, too,” said the Major.

“The second line is completely effaced,” continued the Captain; “but here are two important words on the third. There is ZWEI, which means TWO, and ATROSEN or MATROSEN, the German for SAILORS.”

“Then I suppose it is about a captain and two sailors,” said Lady Helena.

“It seems so,” replied Lord Glenarvan.

“I must confess, your Lordship, that the next word puzzles me. I can make nothing of it. Perhaps the third document may throw some light on it. The last two words are plain enough. BRINGT IHNEN means BRING THEM; and, if you recollect, in the English paper we had SSISTANCE, so by putting the parts together, it reads thus, I think: ‘BRING THEM ASSISTANCE.’”

“Yes, that must be it,” replied Lord Glenarvan. “But where are the poor fellows? We have not the slightest indication of the place, meantime, nor of where the catastrophe happened.”

“Perhaps the French copy will be more explicit,” suggested Lady Helena.

“Here it is, then,” said Lord Glenarvan, “and that is in a language we all know.”

The words it contained were these:

troi ats tannia gonie austral abor contin pr cruel indi jete ongit et 37 degrees 11” LAT

“There are figures!” exclaimed Lady Helena. “Look!”

“Let us go steadily to work,” said Lord Glenarvan, “and begin at the beginning. I think we can make out from the incomplete words in the first line that a three-mast vessel is in question, and there is little doubt about the name; we get that from the fragments of the other papers; it is the BRITANNIA. As to the next two words, GONIE and AUSTRAL, it is only AUSTRAL that has any meaning to us.”

“But that is a valuable scrap of information,” said John Mangles. “The shipwreck occurred in the southern hemisphere.”

“That’s a wide world,” said the Major.

“Well, we’ll go on,” resumed Glenarvan. “Here is the word ABOR; that is clearly the root of the verb ABORDER. The poor men have landed somewhere; but where? CONTIN—does that mean continent? CRUEL!”

“CRUEL!” interrupted John Mangles. “I see now what GRAUS is part of in the second document. It is GRAUSAM, the word in German for CRUEL!”

“Let’s go on,” said Lord Glenarvan, becoming quite excited over his task, as the incomplete words began to fill up and develop their meaning. “INDI,—is it India where they have been shipwrecked? And what can this word ONGIT be part of? Ah! I see—it is LONGITUDE; and here is the latitude, 37 degrees 11”. That is the precise indication at last, then!”

“But we haven’t the longitude,” objected McNabbs.

“But we can’t get everything, my dear Major; and it is something at all events, to have the exact latitude. The French document is decidedly the most complete of the three; but it is plain enough that each is the literal translation of the other, for they all contain exactly the same number of lines. What we have to do now is to put together all the words we have found, and translate them into one language, and try to ascertain their most probable and logical sense.”

“Well, what language shall we choose?” asked the Major.

“I think we had better keep to the French, since that was the most complete document of the three.”

“Your Lordship is right,” said John Mangles, “and besides, we’re all familiar with the language.”

“Very well, then, I’ll set to work.”

In a few minutes he had written as follows:

7 Juin 1862 trois-mats Britannia Glasgow sombre gonie austral a terre deux matelots capitaine Gr abor contin pr cruel indi jete ce document de longitude et 37 degrees 11” de latitude Portez-leur secours perdus.

[7th of June, 1862 three-mast BRITANNIA Glasgow] foundered gonie southern on the coast two sailors Gr Captain landed contin pr cruel indi thrown this document in longitude and 37 degrees 11” latitude Bring them assistance lost

Just at that moment one of the sailors came to inform the captain that they were about entering the Firth of Clyde, and to ask what were his orders.

“What are your Lordship’s intentions?” said John Mangles, addressing Lord Glenarvan.

“To get to Dunbarton as quickly as possible, John; and Lady Helena will return to Malcolm Castle, while I go on to London and lay this document before the Admiralty.”

The sailor received orders accordingly, and went out to deliver them to the mate.

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