spoken about before this, but I wanted to know a little more clearly where I was. No use to raise hopes and let them down again. But it’s facts, not hopes, with us now. You may remember that day we found the pterodactyl rookery in the swamp — what? Well, somethin’ in the lie of the land took my notice. Perhaps it has escaped you, so I will tell you. It was a volcanic vent full of blue clay.” The Professors nodded.
“Well, now, in the whole world I’ve only had to do with one place that was a volcanic vent of blue clay. That was the great De Beers Diamond Mine of Kimberley — what? So you see I got diamonds into my head. I rigged up a contraption to hold off those stinking beasts, and I spent a happy day there with a spud. This is what I got.”
He opened his cigar-box, and tilting it over he poured about twenty or thirty rough stones, varying from the size of beans to that of chestnuts, on the table.
“Perhaps you think I should have told you then. Well, so I should, only I know there are a lot of traps for the unwary, and that stones may be of any size and yet of little value where color and consistency are clean off. Therefore, I brought them back, and on the first day at home I took one round to Spink’s, and asked him to have it roughly cut and valued.”
He took a pill-box from his pocket, and spilled out of it a beautiful glittering diamond, one of the finest stones that I have ever seen.
“There’s the result,” said he. “He prices the lot at a minimum of two hundred thousand pounds. Of course it is fair shares between us. I won’t hear of anythin’ else. Well, Challenger, what will you do with your fifty thousand?”
“If you really persist in your generous view,” said the Professor, “I should found a private museum, which has long been one of my dreams.”
“And you, Summerlee?”
“I would retire from teaching, and so find time for my final classification of the chalk fossils.”
“I’ll use my own,” said Lord John Roxton, “in fitting a well-formed expedition and having another look at the dear old plateau. As to you, young fellah, you, of course, will spend yours in gettin’ married.”
“Not just yet,” said I, with a rueful smile. “I think, if you will have me, that I would rather go with you.”
Lord Roxton said nothing, but a brown hand was stretched out to me across the table.
Jules Verne
Journey to the Center of the Earth
Chapter I. The Professor And His Family
Chapter II. A Mystery To Be Solved At Any Price
Chapter III. The Runic Writing Exercises The Professor
Chapter IV. The Enemy To Be Starved Into Submission
Chapter V. Famine, Then Victory, Followed By Dismay
Chapter VI. Exciting Discussions About An Unparalleled Enterprise
Chapter VII. A Woman’s Courage
Chapter VIII. Serious Preparations For Vertical Descent
Chapter IX. Iceland! But What Next?
Chapter X. Interesting Conversations With Icelandic Savants
Chapter XI. A Guide Found To The Centre Of The Earth
Chapter XIII. Hospitality Under The Arctic Circle
Chapter XIV. But Arctics Can Be Inhospitable, Too
Chapter XVI. Boldly Down The Crater
Chapter XVII. Vertical Descent
Chapter XVIII. The Wonders Of Terrestrial Depths
Chapter XIX. Geological Studies In Situ
Chapter XX. The First Signs Of Distress
Chapter XXI. Compassion Fuses The Professor’s Heart
Chapter XXII. Total Failure Of Water
Chapter XXIII. Water Discovered
Chapter XXIV. Well Said, Old Mole! Canst Thou Work I’ The Ground So Fast?
Chapter XXVI. The Worst Peril Of All
Chapter XXVII. Lost In The Bowels Of The Earth
