composed of the softest zostera of the ocean. Your pen is from the fin of a whale; your ink is the liquor secreted by the cuttle-fish. Everything now comes from the sea, and will return to it again some day.”
“You are fond of the sea, captain.”
“Yes; I love it. The sea is everything. It covers seven-tenths of the terrestrial globe. Its breathings are pure and healthy. It is an immense desert, in which man is never lonely, for life is spread around him. The sea is only the medium for a supernatural and wonderful existence; it is nothing but movement and affection; the living infinite, as one of the poets has said. In fact, nature is herein represented by all three kingdoms—the mineral, vegetable, and animal. The last is largely represented by the four groups of zoophytes, three classes of articulated animals, five classes of molluscs, three classes of vertebrates, the mammifers, reptiles, innumerable legions of fish, an infinite order of animals, which includes more than 13,000 species, of which only a tenth part inhabit fresh water. The sea is the vast reservoir of nature. It was by the sea that the world may be said to have commenced; and who knows whether it will not finish it also! There alone is perfect quiet. The sea is not for despots. At the surface it can still exercise its iniquitous rights; there it beats furiously and devours greedily; there it bears all earthly horrors. But at thirty feet below the surface its power ceases, its influence is extinguished, its strength dies out. Ah, Monsieur, live in the bosom of the waters. There alone you will find independence; there I recognise no master; there I am free!”
Captain Nemo suddenly stopped in the midst of
