eberg was stretching both above and beneath into
lengthening slopes; mile after mile it was getting thinner. At length,
at six in the morning of that memorable day, the 19th of March, the
door of the saloon opened, and Captain Nemo appeared.

"The sea is open!!" was all he said.

CHAPTER XIV

THE SOUTH POLE

I rushed on to the platform. Yes! the open sea, with but a few
scattered pieces of ice and moving icebergs--a long stretch of sea; a
world of birds in the air, and myriads of fishes under those waters,
which varied from intense blue to olive green, according to the bottom.
The thermometer marked 3 deg. C. above zero. It was comparatively
spring, shut up as we were behind this iceberg, whose lengthened mass
was dimly seen on our northern horizon.

"Are we at the pole?" I asked the Captain, with a beating heart.

"I do not know," he replied. "At noon I will take our bearings."

"But will the sun show himself through this fog?" said I, looking at
the leaden sky.

"However little it shows, it will be enough," replied the Captain.

About ten miles south a solitary island rose to a height of one hundred
and four yards. We made for it, but carefully, for the sea might be
strewn with banks. One hour afterwards we had reached it, two hours
later we had made the round of it. It measured four or five miles in
circumference. A narrow canal separated it from a considerable stretch
of land, perhaps a continent, for we could not see its limits. The
existence of this land seemed to give some colour to Maury's theory.
The ingenious American has remarked that, between the South Pole and
the sixtieth parallel, the sea is covered with floating ice of enormous
size, which is never met with in the North Atlantic. From this fact he
has drawn the conclusion that the Antarctic Circle encloses
considerable continents, as icebergs cannot form in open sea, but only
on the coasts. According to these calculations, the mass of ice
surrounding the southern pole forms a vast cap, the circumference of
which must be, at least, 2,500 miles. But the Nautilus, for fear of
running aground, had stopped about three cable-lengths from a strand
over which reared a superb heap of rocks. The boat was launched; the
Captain, two of his men, bearing instruments, Conseil, and myself were
in it. It was ten in the morning. I had not seen Ned Land. Doubtless
the Canadian did not wish to admit the presence of the South Pole. A
few stro