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Ruhmkorff's apparatus,
"there is no telling how far we may go."
The rugged peaks of the trachyte rocks presented faint outlines on the eastern horizon; at times a few patches of snow, concentrating the vague light, glittered upon the slopes of the distant mountains; certain peaks, boldly uprising, passed through the grey clouds, and reappeared above the moving mists, like breakers emerging in the heavens.
Beautiful description of nature.
The horrible disease of leprosy is too common in Iceland; it is not contagious, but hereditary, and lepers are forbidden to marry.
Check the truth in this fact about iceland.
Who can assure us that an eruption is not brewing at this very moment? Does it follow that because the monster has slept since 1229 he must therefore never awake again?
"You see all these volumes of steam, Axel; well, they demonstrate that we have nothing to fear from the fury of a volcanic eruption." "Am I to believe that?" I cried. "Understand this clearly," added the Professor. "At the approach of an eruption these jets would redouble their activity, but disappear altogether during the period of the eruption. For the elastic fluids, being no longer under pressure, go off by way of the crater instead of escaping by their usual passages through the fissures in the soil. Therefore, if these vapours remain in their usual condition, if they display no
...more
When science has uttered her voice, let babblers hold their peace.'
Sometimes he would halt, pick up a few bits of stone, build them up into a recognisable form, and thus made landmarks to guide us in our way back.
He himself seemed to possess an instinct for equilibrium, for he never stumbled.
I was thus steeped in the marvellous ecstasy which all high summits develop in the mind; and now without giddiness, for I was beginning to be accustomed to these sublime aspects of nature. My dazzled eyes were bathed in the bright flood of the solar rays. I was forgetting where and who I was, to live the life of elves and sylphs, the fanciful creation of Scandinavian superstitions. I felt intoxicated with the sublime pleasure of lofty elevations without thinking of the profound abysses into which I was shortly to be plunged.
He uncoiled a cord of the thickness of a finger, and four hundred feet long; first he dropped half of it down, then he passed it round a lava block that projected conveniently, and threw the other half down the chimney. Each of us could then descend by holding with the hand both halves of the rope, which would not be able to unroll itself from its hold; when two hundred feet down, it would be easy to get possession of the whole of the rope by letting one end go and pulling down by the other.
Very simple and ordinary technique. This, however, reduces the length of the rope by half. Some knots could have served the purpose better.
Pliocene, miocene, eocene, cretaceous, jurassic, triassic, permian, carboniferous, devonian, silurian, or primitive
this instrument would become useless as soon as the weight of the atmosphere should exceed the pressure ascertained at the level of the sea.
"Monday, July 1. "Chronometer, 8.17 a.m.; barometer, 297 in.; thermometer, 6° (43° F.). Direction, E.S.E."
It seemed as if the genii of the depths were lighting up their palace to receive their terrestrial guests.
According to exact observations, the increase of temperature in the interior of the globe advances at the rate of one degree (1 4/5° Fahr.) for every hundred feet.
I only hope, thought I, that this so-called extinct volcano won't take a fancy in his old age to begin his sports again!
trilobite.
Thus were formed those immense coalfields, which nevertheless, are not inexhaustible, and which three centuries at the present accelerated rate of consumption will exhaust unless the industrial world will devise a remedy.
I had kept it as a precious treasure at the bottom of my flask. Twenty times, nay, a hundred times, have I fought against a frightful impulse to drink it off. But no, Axel, I kept it for you."
When Columbus asked of his ships' crews for three days more to discover a new world, those crews, disheartened and sick as they were, recognised the justice of the claim, and he discovered America. I am the Columbus of this nether world, and I only ask for one more day.
You have now but a few hours to tempt fortune.
Suppose some displacement should occur and crush us all! Suppose the torrent, bursting through, should drown us in a sudden flood!
Exactly!
The tunnel was filling with steam,
If the tunnel/ gallery was quickly getting filled by steam and boiling water wasnt it a deadly situation?
this is a chalybeate spring!" "Nothing could be better for the digestion,"
"Well, let us allow the water to run on. It will flow down, and will both guide and refresh us."
Fine if the stream is not huge and water fills the tunnel at a much slower rate than they move.
troglodyte [1] life.
You know that it is at the surface of the globe that weight is most sensibly felt, and that at the centre there is no weight at all."
I shouted. No reply: my voice was lost in the midst of the cavernous echoes which alone replied to my call.
This is a killing feeling. Can easily give one a heart attack!
Upon earth, in the midst of the darkest night, light never abdicates its functions altogether. It is still subtle and diffusive, but whatever little there may be, the eye still catches that little. Here there was not an atom; the total darkness made me totally blind.
Whence
Words failed me to express my feelings.
the first of those monsters has a porpoise's snout, a lizard's head, a crocodile's teeth; and hence our mistake. It is the ichthyosaurus (the fish lizard), the most terrible of the ancient monsters of the deep."
"The other is a plesiosaurus (almost lizard), a serpent, armoured with the carapace and the paddles of a turtle; he is the dreadful enemy of the other."
a monster that a hundred whales a day would not satisfy!
When we have reached the centre of the globe, either we shall find some new way to get back, or we shall come back like decent folks the way we came.
antipodes!"
Therefore there seemed no reason to doubt that during the storm there had been a sudden change of wind unperceived by us, which had brought our raft back to the shore which we thought we had left so long a distance behind us.
Here he stood facing an immense collection of scattered leptotheria, mericotheria, lophiodia, anoplotheria, megatheria, mastodons, protopithecæ, pterodactyles, and all sorts of extinct monsters here assembled together for his special satisfaction.
mastodons
The facial angle is formed by two lines, one touching the brow and the front teeth, the other from the orifice of the ear to the lower line of the nostrils. The greater this angle, the higher intelligence denoted by the formation of the skull. Prognathism is that projection of the jaw-bones which sharpens or lessons this angle, and which is illustrated in the negro countenance and in the lowest savages.
universal diffusion of light.
