Jules Verne Quotes

“None can sleep more soundly than a Turk, when the Turk has a good digestion and an easy conscience. This was the case with Kéraban, and many attempts were made to rouse him.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“for nothing’s more natural than for one man to give himself up to save two others. That’s mathematics!”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“solid bottom of hard granite, which afforded a firm hold. There was no danger now of either being driven away”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“A curious country,” writes Van Mitten in his note-book, as he hastily jotted down some random impressions of the journey. “The women work in the fields and carry burthens, while the men spin flax and knit in wool.” The worthy Dutchman was not mistaken: such are still the customs in the distant province of Lazistan, where the second portion of the journey was commenced.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“The Kalmucks are small of stature, but robust; excellent horsemen, quick, agile, and smart. Their food is a little flour, mixed with water, and cooked with horseflesh. But they are confirmed drunkards, skilful thieves, ignorant, superstitious to excess, incorrigible gamblers, like all the nomads of the Caucasian steppes.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“That may be, for there is a reason for everything, and nothing happens without a cause, which God sometimes lets students find out; so, Doctor, find it out if you can.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“Passepartout noticed in the crowd a number of the natives who seemed very old and were dressed in yellow. On going into a barber’s to get shaved he learned that these ancient men were all at least eighty years old, at which age they are permitted to wear yellow, which is the Imperial colour.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“As for Passepartout, he was ready for anything that might be proposed. His master’s idea charmed him; he perceived a heart, a soul, under that icy exterior. He began to love Phileas Fogg.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“We’re over it! we’re over it! we’re clear!” cried out an exulting voice that made Ferguson’s heart leap to his throat. The daring fellow was there, grasping the lower rim of the car, and running afoot over the top of the mountain, thus lightening the balloon of his whole weight. He had to hold on with all his strength, too, for it was likely to escape his grasp at any moment. When he had reached the opposite declivity, and the abyss was before him, Joe, by a vigorous effort, hoisted himself from the ground, and, clambering up by the cordage, rejoined his friends.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“Such was the Sonray country, with its villages topped with roofs turned over like Armenian caps.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“The negroes were busy poisoning arrows with the juice of the euphorbium — a piece of work deemed a great affair among these savage tribes, and carried on with a sort of ceremonial solemnity.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“Great energy of character was needed to enable him thus to sustain the situation with philosophy. Hunger conspired with fatigue to crush him, for a man’s system is not greatly restored and fortified by a diet of roots, the pith of plants, such as the Mele, or the fruit of the doum palm-tree; and yet, according to his own calculations, Joe was enabled to push on about twenty miles to the westward. His body bore in scores of places the marks of the thorns with which the lake-reeds, the acacias, the mimosas, and other wild shrubbery through which he had to force his way, are thickly studded; and his torn and bleeding feet rendered walking both painful and difficult. But at length he managed to react against all these sufferings; and when evening came again, he resolved to pass the night on the shores of Lake Tchad. There he had to endure the bites of myriads of insects — gnats, mosquitoes, ants half an inch long, literally covered the ground; and, in less than two hours, Joe had not a rag remaining of the garments that had covered him, the insects having devoured them! It was a terrible night, that did not yield our exhausted traveller an hour of sleep. During all this time the wild-boars and native buffaloes, reenforced by the ajoub — a very dangerous species of lamantine — carried on their ferocious revels in the bushes and under the waters of the lake, filling the night with a hideous concert. Joe dared scarcely breathe. Even his courage and coolness had hard work to bear up against so terrible a situation.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“Throw out something — something more!” cried the doctor. “There is nothing more to throw!” was Kennedy’s despairing response. “Yes, there is!” called Joe, and with a wave of the hand he disappeared like a flash, over the edge of the car.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“The birds then collected at a short distance, yet to near that their naked necks, entirely bare of feathers, could be plainly seen, as they stretched them out with the effort of their cries, while their gristly crests, garnished with a comb and gills of deep violet, stood erect with rage. They were of the very largest size, their bodies being more than three feet in length, and the lower surface of their white wings glittering in the sunlight. They might well have been considered winged sharks, so striking was their resemblance to those ferocious rangers of the deep.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“And, sure enough, with an accompaniment of musket-shots, yelling, and din of every description, the mass of fire was, indeed, mounting toward the Victoria. Joe got ready to throw out ballast, and Ferguson was not long at guessing the truth. Thousands of pigeons, their tails garnished with combustibles, had been set loose and driven toward the Victoria; and now, in their terror, they were flying high up, zigzagging the atmosphere with lines of fire. Kennedy was preparing to discharge all his batteries into the middle of the ascending multitude, but what could he have done against such a numberless army? The pigeons were already whisking around the car; they were even surrounding the balloon, the sides of which, reflecting their illumination, looked as though enveloped with a network of fire. The doctor dared hesitate no longer; and, throwing out a fragment of quartz, he kept himself beyond the reach of these dangerous assailants; and, for two hours afterward, he could see them wandering hither and thither through the darkness of the night, until, little by little, their light diminished, and they, one by one, died out. “Now we may sleep in quiet,” said the doctor. “Not badly got up for barbarians,” mused friend Joe, speaking his thoughts aloud. “Oh, they employ these pigeons frequently, to set fire to the thatch of hostile villages; but this time the village mounted higher than they could go.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“an elevation of more than eight thousand feet, the greatest height attained during the journey.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“My God! my God!” exclaimed the dying apostle, “have pity on me!” His countenance shone. Far above that earth on which he had known no joys; in the midst of that night which sent to him its softest radiance; on the way to that heaven toward which he uplifted his spirit, as though in a miraculous assumption, he seemed already to live and breathe in the new existence. His last gesture was a supreme blessing on his new friends of only one day. Then he fell back into the arms of Kennedy, whose countenance was bathed in hot tears.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“Let go all!” shouted the doctor, and at the word the Victoria shot rapidly up into the sky, while the four carronades on board the Resolute thundered forth a parting salute in her honor.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection

“The network that supported the car was made of very strong hempen cord, and the two valves were the object of the most minute and careful attention, as the rudder of a ship would be. The car, which was of a circular form and fifteen feet in diameter, was made of wicker-work, strengthened with a slight covering of iron, and protected below by a system of elastic springs, to deaden the shock of collision. Its weight, along with that of the network, did not exceed two hundred and fifty pounds.”
― Jules Verne, Jules Verne: The Collection