《Around the World In 80 Days》 CHAPTER11
by Jules Verne
The train had started punctually. Among the passengers were a number
of officers, Government officials, and opium and indigo merchants, whose
business called them to the eastern coast. Passepartout rode in the
same carriage with his master, and a third passenger occupied a seat
opposite to them. This was Sir Francis Cromarty, one of Mr Fogg's whist
partners on the `Mongolia', now on his way to join his corps at Benares.
Sir Francis was a tall, fair man of fifty, who had greatly distinguished
himself in the last Sepoy revolt. He made India his homer only paying
brief visits to England at rare intervals; and war almost as familiar
as a native with the customs, history and character of India and its
people. But Phileas Fogg, who was not travelling, but only describing
a circumference, took no pains to inquire into these subjects; he was
a solid body, traversing an orbit around the terrestrial globe, according
to the laws of rational mechanics. He was at this moment calculating
in his mind the number of hours spent since his departure from London,
and, had it been in his nature to make a useless demonstration, would
have rubbed his hands for satisfaction. Sir Francis Cromarty had observed
the oddity of his travelling companion - although the only opportunity
he had for studying him had been while he was dealing the cards, and
between two rubbers - and questioned himself whether a human heart really
beat beneath this cold exterior, and whether Phileas Fogg had any sense
of the beauties of nature. The brigadier-general was free to mentally
confess, that, of all the eccentric persons he had ever met, none was
comparable to this product of the exact sciences.
Phileas Fogg had not concealed from Sir Francis his design of going
round the world, nor the circumstances under which he set out; and the
general only saw in the wager a useless eccentricity and a lack of sound
common sense. In the way this strange gentleman was going on, he would
leave the world without having done any good to himself or anybody else.
An hour after leaving Bombay the train had passed the viaducts and
the island Salcette, and had got into the open country. At Callyan they
reached the junction of the branch line which descends towards southeastern
India by Kandallah and Pounah; and, passing Pauwell, they entered the
defiles of the mountains, with their basalt bases, and their summits
crowned with thick and verdant forests. Phileas Fogg and Sir Francis
Cromarty exchanged a few words from time to time, and now Sir Francis,
reviving the conversation, observed, `Some years ago, Mr Fogg, you would
have met with a delay at this point which would probably have lost you
your wager.'
`How so, Sir Francis?'
`Because the railway stopped at the base of these mountains, which
the passengers were obliged to cross in palanquins or on ponies to Kandallah,
on the other side.'
`Such a delay would not have deranged my plans in the least,' said
Mr Fogg. `I have constantly foreseen the likelihood of certain obstacles.'
`But, Mr Fogg,' pursued Sir Francis, `you run the risk of having some
difficulty about this worthy fellow's adventure at the pagoda.' Passepartout,
his feet comfortably wrapped in his travelling-blanket, was sound asleep,
and did not dream that anybody was talking about him. The Government
is very severe upon that kind of offence. It takes particular care that
the religious customs of the Indians should be respected, and if your
servant were caught--'
`Very well, Sir Francis,' replied Mr Fogg; `if he had been caught he
would have been condemned and punished, and then would have quietly
returned to Europe. I don't see how this affair could have delayed his
master.'
The conversation fell again. During the night the train left the mountains
behind, and passed Nassik, and the next day proceeded over the flat,
well-cultivated country of the khandeish, with its straggling villages,
above which rose the minarets of the pagodas. This fertile territory
is watered by numerous small rivers and limpid streams, mostly tributaries
of the Godavery.
Passepartout, on waking and looking out, could not realize that he
was actually crossing India in a railway train. The locomotive, guided
by an English engineer and fed with English coal, threw out its smoke
upon cotton, coffee, nutmeg, clove and pepper plantations, while the
steam curled in spirals around groups of palm-trees, in the midst of
which were seen picturesque bungalows, viharis (a sort of abandoned
monasteries), and marvellous temples enriched by the exhaustless ornamentation
of Indian architecture. Then they came upon vast tracts extending to
the horizon, with jungles inhabited by snakes and tigers, which fled
at the noise of the train; succeeded by forests penetrated by the railway,
and still haunted by elephants which, with pensive eyes, gazed at the
train as it passed. The travellers crossed, beyond Malligaum, the fatal
country so often stained with blood by the sectaries of the goddess
Kali. Not far off rose Ellora, with its graceful pagodas, and the famous
Aurungabad, capital of the ferocious Aureng-Zeb, now the chief town
of one of the detached provinces of the kingdom of the Nizam. It was
thereabouts that Feringhea, the Thuggee chief, king of the stranglers,
held his sway. These ruffians, united by a secret bond, strangled victims
of every age in honour of the goddess Death, without ever shedding blood;
there was a period when this part of the country could scarcely be travelled
over without corpses being found in every direction. The English Government
has succeeded in greatly diminishing these murders, though the Thuggees
still exist, and pursue the exercise of their horrible rites.
At half-past twelve the train stopped at Burhampoor, where Passepartout
was able to purchase some Indian slippers, ornamented with false pearls,
in which, with evident vanity, he proceeded to incase his feet. The
travellers made a hasty breakfast and started off for Assurghur, after
skirting for a little the banks of the small river Tapty, which empties
into the Gulf of Cambray, near Surat.
Passepartout was now plunged into absorbing reverie. Up to his arrival
at Bombay, he had entertained hopes that their journey would end there;
but now that they were plainly whirling across India at full speed,
a sudden change had come over the spirit of his dreams. His old vagabond
nature returned to him; the fantastic ideas of his youth once more took
possession of him. He carne to regard his master's project as intended
in good earnest, believed in the reality of the bet, and therefore in
the tour of the worlds and the necessity of making it without fail within
the designated period. Already he began to worry about possible delays,
and accidents which might happen on the way. He recognized himself as
being personally interested in the wager, and trembled at the thought
that he might have been the means of losing it by his unpardonable folly
of the night before. Being much less cool-headed than Mr Fogg, he was
much more restless, counting and recounting the days passed over, uttering
maledictions when the train stopped, and accusing it of sluggishness,
and mentally blaming Mr Fogg for not having bribed the engineer. The
worthy fellow was ignorant that, while it was possible by such means
to hasten the rate of a steamer, it could not be done on the railway.
The train entered the defiles of the Sutpour Mountains, which separate
the Khandeish from Bundelcund, towards evening. The next day Sir Francis
Cromarty asked Passepartout what time it was; to which, on consulting
his watch, he replied that it was three in the morning. This famous
timepiece, always regulated on the Greenwich meridian, which was now
some seventy-seven degrees westward, was at least four hours slow. Sir
Francis corrected Passepartout's time, whereupon the latter made the
same remark that he had done to Fix; and upon the general insisting
that the watch should be regulated in each new meridian, since he was
constantly going east-ward, that is in the face of the sun, and therefore
the days were shorter by four minutes for each degree gone over, Passepartout
obstinately refused to alter his watch, which he kept at London time.
It was an innocent delusion which could harm no one.
The train stopped, at eight o'clock, in the midst of a glade some fifteen
miles beyond Rothal, where there were several bungalows and workmen's
cabins.
The conductor, passing along the carriages, shouted, `Passengers will
get out here!'
Phileas Fogg looked at Sir Francis Cromarty for an explanation; but
the general could not tell what meant a halt in the midst of this forest
of dates and acacias.
Passepartout, not less surprised, rushed out and speedily returned,
crying: `Monsieur, no more railway!'
`What do you mean?' asked Sir Francis.
`I mean to say that the train isn't going on.'
The general at once stepped out, while Phileas Fogg calmly followed
him, and they proceeded together to the conductor.
`Where are we?' asked Sir Francis.
`At the hamlet of Kholby.'
`Do we stop here?'
`Certainly. The railway isn't finished.'
`What! not finished?'
`No. There's still a matter of fifty miles to be laid from here to
Allahabad, where the line begins again.'
`But the papers announced the opening of the railway throughout.'
`What would you have, officer? The papers were mistaken.'
`Yet you sell tickets from Bombay to Calcutta,' retorted Sir Francis,
who was growing warm.
`No doubt,' replied the conductor; `but the passengers know that they
must provide means of transportation for themselves from Kholby to Allahabad.'
Sir Francis was furious. Passepartout would willingly have knocked
the conductor down, and did not dare to look at his master.
`Sir Francis,' said Mr Fogg quietly, `we will, if you please, look
about for some means of conveyance to Allahabad.'
`Mr Fogg, this is a delay greatly to your disadvantage.'
`No, Sir Francis; it was foreseen.'
`What! You knew that the way--'
`Not at all; but I knew that some obstacle or other would sooner or
later arise on my route. Nothing, therefore, is lost. I have two days,
which I have already gained, to sacrifice. A steamer leaves Calcutta
for Hong Kong at noon, on the 25th. This is the 22nd, and we shall reach
Calcutta in time.'
There was nothing to say to so confident a response.
It was but too true that the railway came to a termination at this
point. The papers were like some watches, which have a way of getting
too fast, and had been premature in their announcement of the completion
of the line. The greater part of the travellers were aware of this interruption,
and leaving the train, they began to engage such vehicles as the village
could provide - four-wheeled palkigharis, waggons drawn by zebus, carriages
that looked like perambulating pagodas, palanquins, ponies and what
not.
Mr Fogg and Sir Francis Cromarty, after searching the village from
end to end, came back without having found anything.
`I shall go afoot,' said Phileas Fogg.
Passepartout, who had now rejoined his master, made a wry grimace,
as he thought of his magnificent, but too frail Indian shoes. Happily
he too had been looking about him, and, after a moment's hesitation,
said, `Monsieur, I think I have found a means of conveyance.'
`What?'
`An elephant! An elephant that belongs to an Indian who lives but a
hundred steps from here.'
`Let's go and see the elephant,' replied Mr Fogg.
They soon reached a small hut, near which, enclosed within some high
Palings, was the animal in question. An Indian came out of the hut,
and, at their request, conducted them within the enclosure. The elephant,
which its owner had reared, not for a beast of burden, but for warlike
purposes, was hall domesticated. The Indian had begun already, by often
irritating him, and feeding him every three months on sugar and butter,
to impart to him a ferocity not in his nature, this method being often
employed by those who train the Indian elephants for battle. Happily,
how ever, for Mr Fogg, the animal's instruction in this direction had
not gone far, and the elephant still preserved his natural gentleness.
Kiouni - this was the name of the beast - could doubtless travel rapidly
for a long time, and, in default of any other means of Conveyance, Mr
Fogg resolved to hire him. But elephants are far from cheap in India,
where they are becoming scarce; the males, which alone are suitable
for circus shows, are much sought, especially as but few of them are
domesticated. When, therefore, Mr Fogg proposed to the Indian to hire
Kiouni, he refused point-blank. Mr Fogg persisted, offering the excessive
sum of ten pounds an hour for the loan of the beast to Allahabad. Refused.
Twenty pounds? Refused also. Forty pounds? Still refused. Passepartout
jumped at each advance; but the Indian declined to be tempted. Yet the
offer was an alluring one, for, supposing it took the elephant fifteen
hours to reach Allahabad, his owner would receive no less than six hundred
pounds sterling.
Phileas Fogg, without getting in the least flurried, then proposed
to purchase the animal outright, and at first offered a thousand pounds
for him. The Indian, perhaps thinking he was going to make a great bargain,
still refused.
Sir Francis Cromarty took Mr Fogg aside, and begged him to reflect
before he went any further; to which that gentleman replied that he
was not in the habit of acting rashly, that a bet of twenty thousand
pounds was at stake, that the elephant was absolutely necessary to him,
and that he would secure him if he had to pay twenty times his value.
Returning to the Indian, whose small, sharp eyes, glistening with avarice,
betrayed that with him it was only a question of how great a price he
could obtain, Mr Fogg offered first twelve hundred, then fifteen hundred,
eighteen hundred, two thousand pounds. Passepartout, usually so rubicund,
was fairly white with suspense.
At two thousand pounds the Indian yielded.
`What a price, good heaven!' cried Passepartout, `for an elephant!'
It only remained now to find a guide, which was comparatively easy.
A young Parsee, with an intelligent face, offered his services, which
Mr Fogg accepted, promising so generous a reward as to materially stimulate
his zeal. The elephant was led out and equipped. The Parsee, who was
an accomplished elephant driver, covered his back with a sort of saddle-cloth,
and attached to each of his flanks some curiously uncomfortable howdahs.
Phileas Fogg paid the Indian with some bank-notes which he extracted
from the famous carpet-bag, a proceeding that seemed to deprive poor
Passepartout of his vitals. Then he offered to carry Sir Francis to
Allahabad, which the brigadier gratefully accepted, as one traveller
the more would not be likely to fatigue the gigantic beast. Provisions
were purchased at Kholby, and while Sir Francis and Mr Fogg took the
howdahs on either side, Passepartout got astride the saddle-cloth between
them. The Parsee perched himself on the elephant's neck, and at nine
o'clock they set out from the village, the animal marching off through
the dense forest of palms by the shortest cut.
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