An Antarctic Mystery, page 189 by Jules Verne
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etermined to solve this question if possible, having mounted to the extreme top, not without risk of breaking his neck, came into such violent contact with a quebranta huesos--a sort of gigantic petrel measuring twelve feet with spread wings--that he was flung on his back.
"Curse the bird!" he said on his return to the camp, addressing the observation to me. "I have had a narrow escape! A thump, and down I went, sprawling. I saved myself I don't know how, for I was all but over the side. Those ice ledges, you know, slip through one's fingers like water. I called out to the bird, 'Can't you even look before you, you fool?' But what was the good of that? The big blunderer did not even beg my pardon!"
In the afternoon of the same day our ears were assailed by a hideous braying from below. Hurliguerly remarked that as there were no asses to treat us to the concert, it must be given by penguins. Hitherto these countless dwellers in the polar regions had not thought proper to accompany us on our moving island; we had not seen even one, either at tile foot of the iceberg or on the drifting packs. There could be no doubt that they were there in thousands, for the music was unmistakably that of a multitude of performers. Now those birds frequent by choice the edges of the coasts of islands and continents in high latitudes, or the ice-fields in their neighbourhood. Was not their presence an indication that land was near?
I asked Captain Len Guy what he thought of the presence of these birds.
"I think what you think, Mr. Jeorling," he replied. "Since we have been drifting, none of them have taken refuge on the iceberg, and here they are now in crowds, if we may judge by their deafening cries. From whence do they come? No doubt from land, which is probably near."
"Is this West's opinion?"
"Yes, Mr. Jeorling, and you know he is not given to vain imaginations."
"Certainly not."
"And then anot