In Search of the Castaways
The book tells the story of the quest for Captain Grant of the Britannia. After finding a bottle cast into the ocean by the captain himself after the Britannia is shipwrecked, Lord and Lady Glenarvan of Scotland contact Mary and Robert, the young daughter and son of Captain Grant, through an announcement in a newspaper. Moved by the children's condition, Lord and Lady Glenarvan decide to launch a rescue expedition. The main difficulty is that the coordinates of the wreckage are mostly erased, and only the latitude (37 degrees) is known; thus, the expedition would have to circum-navigate the 37th parallel. Remaining clues consist of a few words in three languages. They are re-interpreted several times throughout the novel to make various destinations seem likely. (Summary from Wikipedia)
s; they hunt kangaroos. In New Zealand they take refuge amid hot sulphur springs and in a house "tabooed"; they escape by starting a volcano into eruption.
Here then are fancy and extravagance mixed with truth and information. Verne has done a vast and useful work in stimulating the interest not only of Frenchmen but of all civilised nations, with regard to the lesser known regions of our globe. He has broadened knowledge and guided study. During the years following 1865 he even, for a time, deserted his favorite field of labor, fiction, and devoted himself to a popular semi-scientific book, now superseded by later works, entitled "The Illustrated Geography of France and her Colonies."
Verne has perhaps had a larger share than any other single individual in causing the ever-increasing yearly tide of international travel. And because with mutual knowledge among the nations comes mutual understanding and appreciation, mutual brotherhood; hence Jules Verne was one of the first and greatest of those
