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October 21, 2025 • 14 mins
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Chapter thirteen, The Shadow of Scataris. Our supper was eaten
with ease and rapidity, after which everybody did the best
he could for himself within the hollow of the crater.
The bed was hard, the shelter on satisfactory, the situation painful,
lying in the open air five thousand feet above the
level of the sea. Nevertheless, it has seldom happened to

(00:22):
me to sleep so well as I did on that
particular night. I did not even dream so much for
the effects of what my uncle called wholesome fatigue. Next day,
when we awoke under the rays of a bright and
glorious sun, we were nearly frozen by the keen air.
I left my granite couch and made one of the
party to enjoy a view of the magnificent spectacle which

(00:45):
developed itself PANORAMAI like at our feet I stood upon
the lofty summit of Mount Sneffel's southern peak. Thence I
was able to obtain a view of the greater part
of the island. The optical delusion, common to all lofty heights,
raised the sh shores of the island. While the central
portions appeared depressed, it was by no means too great

(01:06):
a flight of fancies to believe that a giant picture
was stretched out before me. I could see the deep
valleys that crossed each other in every direction. I could
see precipices looking like the sides of wells, lakes that
seemed to be changed into ponds, ponds that looked like puddles,
and rivers that were transformed into petty brooks. To my
right were glaciers upon glaciers, and multiplied peaks topped with

(01:29):
light clouds of smoke. The undulation of these infinite numbers
of mountains, whose snowy summits make them look as if
covered by foam, recalled to my remembrance the surface of
a storm beaten ocean. If I looked towards the west,
the ocean lay before me in all its majestic grandeur,
a continuation, as it were, of these fleecy hilltops where

(01:52):
the earth ended and the sea began. It was impossible
for the eye to distinguish. I soon felt that strange
and mysterious sensation which is awakened in the mind when
looking down from lofty hilltops, and now I was able
to do so without any feeling of nervousness, having fortunately
hardened myself to that kind of sublime contemplation, I wholly

(02:14):
forgot who I was and where I was. I became
intoxicated with a sense of lofty sublimity, without thought of
the abysses into which my daring was soon about to
plunge me. I was, presently, however, brought back to the
realities of life by the arrival of the Professor and Hans,
who joined me upon the lofty summit of the peak.

(02:34):
My uncle, turning in a westerly direction, pointed out to
me a light cloud of vapor, a kind of haze,
with a faint outline of land rising out of the waters. Greenland,
said he Greenland, I cried in reply. Yes, continued my uncle,
who always, when explaining anything, spoke as if he were
in a professor's chair. We are not more than thirty

(02:57):
five leagues distant from that wonderful land. When the great
annual break up of the ice takes place, white bears
come over to Iceland, carried by the floating masses of
ice from the north. This, however, is a matter of
little consequence. We are now on the summit of the great,
the transcendent Sneffels, and here are its two peaks north

(03:17):
and south. Hands will tell you the name by which
the people of Iceland call that on which we stand.
My uncle turned to the imperturbable guide, who nodded and spoke,
as usual, one word, Scotdaris. My uncle looked at me
with a proud and triumphant glance. A crater, he said,
you hear, I did hear, but I was totally unable

(03:40):
to make reply. The crater of Mount Sneffels represented an
inverted cone, the gaping orifice apparently half a mile across,
the depth indefinite feet. Conceive what this hole must have
been like when full of flame and thunder and lightning.
The bottom of the funnel shaped hollow was about five
hundred feet in circumference, by which it will be seen

(04:02):
that the slope from the summit to the bottom was
very gradual, and we were therefore clearly able to get
there without much fatigue or difficulty. Involuntarily I compared this
crater to an enormous loaded cannon, and the comparison completely
terrified me. To descend into the interior of a cannon,
I thought to myself, when perhaps it is loaded and
will go off at the least shock is the act

(04:24):
of a madman. But there was no longer any opportunity
for me to hesitate. Hans, with a perfectly calm and
indifferent air, took his usual post at the head of
the adventurous little band. I followed without uttering a syllable.
I felt like the lamb led to the slaughter. In
order to render the descent less difficult, Hans took his

(04:46):
way down the interior of the cone in rather a
zigzag fashion, making, as the sailors say, long tracks to
the eastward followed by equally long ones to the west.
It was necessary to walk through the midst of ieruptive rocks,
some of which, shaken in their balance, went rolling down
with thundering clamor to the bottom of the abyss. These

(05:06):
continual falls awoke echoes of singular power and effect. Many
portions of the cone consisted of inferior glaciers. Hands. Whenever
he met one of these obstacles, advanced with a great
show of precaution, sounding the soil with his long iron pole,
in order to discover fissures and layers of deep soft snow.

(05:27):
In many doubtful or dangerous places. It became necessary for
us to be tied together by a long rope, in
order that should any one of us be unfortunate enough
to slip, he would be supported by his companions. This
connecting link was doubtless a prudent precaution, but not by
any means unattended with danger. Nevertheless, and despite all the
manifold difficulties of the descent along slopes with which our

(05:51):
guide was wholly unacquainted, we made considerable progress Without accident.
One of our great parcels of ropes slipped from one
of the Iceland porters and rushed a short cut to
the bottom of the abyss. By midday we were at
the end of our journey. I looked upwards and saw
only the upper orifice of the cone, which served as
a circular frame to a very small portion of the sky,

(06:14):
a portion which seemed to me singularly beautiful should I
ever again gaze on that lovely sunlit sky. The only
exception to this extraordinary landscape was the peak of Scutaris,
which seemed lost in the great void of the heavens.
The bottom of the crater was composed of three separate shafts,
through which, during periods of eruption, when sneffels was in action.

(06:37):
The great central furnace sent forth its burning lava and
poisonous vapors. Each of these chimneys or shafts gaped open
mouthed in our path. I kept as far away from
them as possible, not even venturing to take the faintest
peep downwards. As for the Professor, after a rapid examination
of their disposition and characteristics, he became breathless and panting.

(06:59):
He ran from one to the other like a delighted schoolboy,
gesticulating wildly and uttering incomprehensible and disjointed phrases in all
sorts of languages. Has the Guide and his humbler companions
seated themselves on some piles of lava and looked silently on.
They clearly took my uncle for a lunatic, and waited
for the result. Suddenly the Professor uttered a wild, unearthly cry.

(07:24):
At first I imagined he had lost his footing and
was falling headlong into one of the yawning gulfs. Nothing
of the kind I saw him. His arms spread out
to their widest extent, his legs stretched apart, standing upright
before an enormous pedestal high enough and black enough to
bear a gigantic stature of Pluto. His attitude and mien
were that of a man utterly stupefied. But his stupefaction

(07:47):
was speedily changed to the wildest joy. Harry, hurry, come here,
he cried, make haste, wonderful, wonderful. Unable to understand what
he meant, I turned to obey his commands. Neither hands
nor the Iceland has moved a step lork, said the professor,
in something of the manner of the French general, pointing

(08:07):
out the pyramids to his army, and fully partaking his stupefaction,
if not his joy. I read on the eastern side
of the huge block of stone, the same characters, half
eaten away by the corrosive action of time. The name
to me a thousand times accursed. Ah Sacnussum, cried my uncle. Now, unbeliever,

(08:28):
you begin to have faith. It was totally impossible for
me to answer a single word. I went back to
my pile of lava in a state of silent awe.
The evidence was unanswerable, overwhelming. In a few moments, however,
my thoughts were far away, back in my German home
with Gretchen and the old cook. What would I have

(08:49):
given for one of my cousin's smiles, for one of
the ancient domestic's omelets, and for my own feather bed.
How long I remained in this state I know not.
All I can say is that, when at last I
raised my head from between my hands, there remained at
the bottom of the crater only myself, my uncle and hands.
The Icelandic porters had been dismissed, and were now descending

(09:10):
the exterior slopes of Mount Sneffels on their way to Stapy.
How heartily did I wish myself with them. Hans slept
tranquility at the foot of a rock, in a kind
of rill of lava, where he had made himself a
rough and ready bed. My uncle was walking about the
bottom of the crater like a wild beast in a cage.
I had no desire, neither had either strength to move

(09:32):
from my recumbent position. Taking example by the guide, I
gave way to a kind of painful somnolency, during which
I seemed both to hear and feel continued heavings and
shudderings in the mountain. In this way we passed our
first night in the interior of the crater. Next morning,
a gray, cloudy, heavy sky hung like a funereal pall

(09:55):
over the summit of the volcanic cone. I did not
notice it so much from the obscurity that reigned about us,
as from the rage from which my uncle was devoured.
I fully understood the reason, and again a glimpse of
hope made my heart leap with joy. I will briefly
explain the cause of the three openings which yawned beneath

(10:15):
our steps. Only one could have been followed by the
adventurous Sagnussum. According to the words of the learned Icelander,
it was only to be known by that one particular
mentioned in the cryptograph, that the shadow of Scartaris fell
upon it, just touching its mouth. In the last days
of the month of June. We were, in fact to
consider the pointed peak as the stylus of an immense

(10:38):
sun dial, the shadow of which pointed on one given day,
like the inexorable finger of fate to the yawning chasm
which led into the interior of the earth. Now, as
often happens in these regions, should the sun fail to
burst through the clouds, no shadow, consequently, no chance of
discovering the right aperture. We had already reached the twenty

(11:00):
fifth of June. If the kindly heavens would only remain
densely clouded for six more days, we should have to
put off our voyage of discovery for another year, when
certainly there would be one person fewer in the party.
I already had sufficient of the mad and monstrous enterprise.
It would be utterly impossible to depict the impotent rage
of Professor Hardwig. The day passed away, and not the

(11:23):
faintest outline of a shadow could be seen at the
bottom of the crater. Hans the guide never moved from
his place. He must have been curious to know what
we were about, if indeed he could believe we were
about anything. As for my uncle, he never addressed a
word to me. He was nursing his wrath to keep
it warm, his eyes fixed on the black and foggy atmosphere,

(11:44):
his complexion hideous with suppressed passion. Never had his eyes
appeared so fierce, his nose so aquiline, his mouth so
hard and firm. On the twenty sixth, no change for
the better. A mixture of rain and snow fell during
the day Hans very quietly built himself a hut of lava,
into which he retired, like Diogenes into his tub. I

(12:08):
took malicious delight in watching the thousand little cascades that
flowed down the side of the cone, carrying with them
at times a stream of stones into the vastly deep below.
My uncle was almost frantic, to be sure. It was
enough to make even a patient man angry. He had
reached to a certain extent the goal of his desires,
and yet he was likely to be wrecked in port.

(12:31):
But if the heavens and the elements are capable of
causing as much pain and sorrow, there are two sides
to a medal, and there was reserved for Professor Hardwig
a brilliant and sudden surprise, which was to compensate him
for all his sufferings. Next day the sky was still overcast.
But on Sunday, the twenty eighth, the last day but
two of the month, with a sudden change of wind

(12:53):
and a new moon, there came a change of weather.
The sun poured its beaming rays to the very bottom
of the crater. Each hillock, every rock, every stone, every
asperity of the soil had its share of the luminous effulgence,
and its shadow fell heavily on the soil, among others.
To his insane delight. The shadow of Scutaris was marked

(13:13):
and clear, and moved slowly with the radiant start of day.
My uncle moved with it in a state of mental ecstasy.
At twelve o'clock, exactly when the sun had attained its
highest altitude for the day, the shadow fell upon the
edge of the central pit. Here it is, gasped the Professor,
in an agony of joy. Here it is we have

(13:35):
found it. Forward, my friends, into the interior of the earth.
I look curiously at hands to see what reply he
would make to this terrific announcement. For it said the
guide tranquility. Forward, it is, answered my uncle, who was
now in the seventh Heaven of Delight. When we were
quite ready, our watches indicated thirteen minutes pass one. End

(14:00):
Chapter thirteen,
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