PAGANEL'S DISCLOSURE.
A profound astonishment greeted these unexpected words. What did the
geographer mean? Had he lost his senses? He spoke, however, with
such conviction that all eyes were turned towards Glenarvan. This
declaration of Paganel was a direct answer to the question the former
had asked. But Glenarvan confined himself to a negative gesture,
indicating disbelief in the geographer, who, as soon as he was master
of his emotion, resumed.
"Yes," said he, in a tone of conviction, "yes, we have gone astray in
our search, and have read in the document what is not written there."
"Explain yourself, Paganel," said the major; "and more calmly."
[Sidenote: A NEW IDEA.]
"That is very simple, major. Like you, I was in error; like you, I
struck upon a false interpretation. When, but a moment ago, at the top
of this tree, in answer to the question, at the word 'Australia' an
idea flashed through my mind, and all was clear."
"What!" cried Glenarvan, "do you pretend that Captain Grant----"
"I pretend," replied Paganel, "that the word _Austral_ in the document
is not complete, as we have hitherto supposed, but the root of the word
_Australia_."
"This is something singular," said the major.
"Singular!" replied Glenarvan, shrugging his shoulders; "it is simply
impossible!"
"Impossible," continued Paganel, "is a word that we do not allow in
France."
"What!" added Glenarvan, in a tone of the greatest incredulity, "do you
pretend, with that document in your possession, that the shipwreck of
the Britannia took place on the shores of Australia?"
"I am sure of it!" replied Paganel.
"By my faith, Paganel," said Glenarvan, "this is a pretension that
astonishes me greatly, coming from the secretary of a geographical
society."
"Why?" inquired Paganel, touched in his sensitive point.
"Because, if you admit the word Australia, you admit at the same time
that there are Indians in that country, a fact which has not yet been
proved."
Paganel was by no means surprised at this argument. He seemingly
expected it, and began to smile.
"My dear Glenarvan," said he, "do not be too hasty in your triumph.
I am going to defeat you completely, as no Englishman has ever been
defeated."
"I ask nothing better. Defeat me, Paganel."
"Listen, then. You say that the Indians mentioned in the document
belong exclusively to Patagonia. The incomplete word _indi_ does not
mean Indians, but natives (_indigènes_). Now do you admit that there
are natives in Australia?"
It must be confessed that Glenarvan now gazed fixedly at Paganel.
"Bravo, Paganel!" said the major.
"Do you admit my interpretation, my dear lord?"
"Yes," replied Glenarvan, "if you can prove to me that the imperfect
word _gonie_ does not relate to the country of the Patagonians."
"No," cried Paganel, "it certainly does not mean Patagonia. Read
anything you will but that."
"But what?"
"_Cosmogonie! théogonie! agonie!_"
"_Agonie!_" cried the major.
"That is indifferent to me," replied Paganel; "the word has no
importance. I shall not even search for what it may signify. The
principal point is that _Austral_ means Australia, and we must have
been blindly following a false trail, not to have discovered before so
evident a meaning. If I had found the document, if my judgment had not
been set aside by your interpretation, I should never have understood
it otherwise."
This time cheers, congratulations, and compliments greeted Paganel's
words. Austin, the sailors, the major, and Robert especially, were
delighted to revive their hopes, and applauded the worthy geographer.
Glenarvan, who had gradually been undeceived, was, as he said, almost
ready to surrender.
"One last remark, my dear Paganel, and I have only to bow before your
sagacity."
"Speak!"
"How do you arrange these newly-interpreted words, and in what way do
you read the document?"
[Illustration: The hunt promised well, and gave hopes of culinary
wonders.]
"Nothing is easier. Here is the document," said Paganel, producing the
precious paper that he had studied so conscientiously for several
days. A profound silence ensued, while the geographer, collecting his
thoughts, took his time to answer. His finger followed the incomplete
lines on the document, while, in a confident tone, he expressed himself
in the following terms:
"'June 7th, 1862, the brig Britannia, of Glasgow, foundered after'--let
us put, if you wish, 'two days, three days,' or, 'a long struggle,'--it
matters little, it is quite unimportant,--'on the coast of Australia.
Directing their course to shore, two sailors and Captain Grant
endeavored to land,' or 'did land on the continent, where they will
be,' or 'are prisoners of cruel natives. They cast this document,' and
so forth. Is it clear?"
"It is clear," replied Glenarvan, "if the word _continent_ can be
applied to Australia, which is only an island."
"Be assured, my dear Glenarvan, the best geographers are agreed in
naming this island the Australian continent."
"Then I have but one thing to say, my friends," cried Glenarvan. "To
Australia, and may Heaven assist us!"
"To Australia!" repeated his companions, with one accord.
"Do you know, Paganel," added Glenarvan, "that your presence on board
the Duncan is a providential circumstance?"
"Well," replied Paganel, "let us suppose that I am an envoy of
Providence, and say no more about it."
[Sidenote: A FESTIVE BANQUET.]
Thus ended this conversation, that in the future led to such great
results. It completely changed the moral condition of the travelers.
They had caught again the thread of the labyrinth in which they had
thought themselves forever lost. A new hope arose on the ruins of
their fallen projects. They could fearlessly leave behind them this
American continent, and already all their thoughts flew away to the
Australian land. On reaching the Duncan, they would not bring despair
on board, and Lady Helena and Mary Grant would not have to lament the
irrevocable loss of the captain. Thus they forgot the dangers of their
situation in their new-found joy, and their only regret was that they
could not start at once.
It was now four o'clock in the afternoon, and they resolved to take
supper at six. Paganel wished to celebrate this joyful day by a
splendid banquet. As the bill of fare was very limited, he proposed
to Robert that they should go hunting "in the neighboring forest,"
at which idea the boy clapped his hands. They took Thalcave's
powder-flask, cleaned the revolvers, loaded them with fine shot, and
started.
"Do not go far," said the major, gravely, to the two huntsmen.
After their departure Glenarvan and MacNabb went to consult the notches
on the tree, while Wilson and Mulready revived the smouldering embers.
Arriving at the surface of this immense lake, they saw no sign of
abatement. The waters seemed to have attained their highest elevation;
but the violence with which they rolled from south to north proved that
the equilibrium of the Argentine rivers was not yet established. Before
the liquid mass could lower, it must first become calm, like the sea
when flood-tide ends and ebb begins. They could not, therefore, expect
a subsidence of the waters so long as they flowed towards the north
with such swiftness.
While Glenarvan and the major were making these observations, reports
resounded in the tree, accompanied by cries of joy almost as noisy.
The clear treble of Robert contrasted sharply with the deep bass of
Paganel, and the strife was which should be the most boyish. The hunt
promised well, and gave hopes of culinary wonders.
When the major and Glenarvan returned to the fire, they had to
congratulate Wilson upon an excellent idea. The honest sailor had
devoted himself to fishing with wonderful success, with the aid of
a pin and a piece of string. Several dozen of little fish, delicate
as smelts, called "mojarras," wriggled in a fold of his poncho, and
seemed likely to make an exquisite dish.
At this moment the hunters descended from the top of the tree. Paganel
carefully carried some black swallows' eggs and a string of sparrows,
which he meant afterwards to serve up as larks. Robert had adroitly
brought down several pairs of "hilgueros,"--little green-and-yellow
birds, which are excellent eating, and very much in demand in the
Montevideo market. The geographer, who knew many ways of preparing
eggs, had to confine himself this time to cooking them in the hot
ashes. However, the repast was as varied as it was delicate. The dried
meat, the hard eggs, the broiled mojarras, and the roast sparrows and
hilgueros, formed a repast which was long remembered.
The conversation was very animated. Paganel was greatly complimented in
his twofold capacity of hunter and cook, and accepted these encomiums
with the modesty that belongs to true merit. Then he gave himself up to
singular observations on the magnificent tree that sheltered them with
its foliage, and whose extent, as he declared, was immense.
"Robert and I," said he jokingly, "imagined ourselves in the open
forest during the hunt. One moment I thought we should be lost. I could
not find my way. The sun was declining towards the horizon. I sought
in vain to retrace my steps. Hunger made itself felt acutely. Already
the gloomy coppices were resounding with the growls of ferocious
beasts,--but no, there are no ferocious beasts, and I am sorry."
"What!" cried Glenarvan, "you are sorry there are no ferocious beasts?"
"Certainly."
"But, when you have everything to fear from their ferocity----"
"Ferocity does not exist,--scientifically speaking," replied the
geographer.
[Illustration: However, the repast was as varied as it was delicate.
The dried meat, the hard eggs, the broiled mojarras, and the roast
sparrows and hilgueros, formed a repast which was long remembered.]
"Ha! this time, Paganel," said the major, "you will not make me admit
the utility of ferocious beasts. What are they good for?"
"Major," cried Paganel, "they are good to form classifications, orders,
families, genera, sub-genera, species----"
"Very fine!" said MacNabb. "I should not have thought of that! If I
had been one of Noah's companions at the time of the deluge, I should
certainly have prevented that imprudent patriarch from putting into
the ark pairs of tigers, lions, bears, panthers, and other animals as
destructive as they were useless."
"Should you have done so?" inquired Paganel.
"I should."
"Well, you would have been wrong in a zoological point of view."
"But not in a human one."
"This is shocking," continued Paganel; "for my part, I should have
preserved all the animals before the deluge of which we are so
unfortunately deprived."
"I tell you," replied MacNabb, "that Noah was right in abandoning them
to their fate, admitting that they lived in his time."
"I tell you that Noah was wrong," retorted Paganel, "and deserves the
malediction of scholars to the end of time."
The listeners to this argument could not help laughing at seeing the
two friends dispute about what Noah ought to have done or left undone.
The major, who had never argued with any one in his life, contrary to
all his principles, was every day at war with Paganel, who must have
particularly excited him.
Glenarvan, according to his custom, interrupted the debate, and said,--
[Sidenote: WANTED, A JAGUAR!]
"However much it is to be regretted, in a scientific or human point of
view, that we are deprived of ferocious animals, we must be resigned
to-day to their absence. Paganel could not hope to encounter any in
this aerial forest."
"No," replied the geographer, "although we beat the bush. It is a pity,
for it would have been a glorious hunt. A ferocious man-eater like the
jaguar! With one blow of his paw he can twist the neck of a horse. When
he has tasted human flesh, however, he returns to it ravenously. What
he likes best is the Indian, then the negro, then the mulatto, and then
the white man."
"However that may be, my good Paganel," said Glenarvan, "so long as
there are no Indians, mulattoes, or negroes among us, I rejoice in
the absence of your dear jaguars. Our situation is not, of course, so
agreeable----"
"What!" cried Paganel, "you complain of your lot?"
"Certainly," replied Glenarvan. "Are you at your ease in these
uncomfortable and uncushioned branches?"
"I have never been more so, even in my own study. We lead the life of
birds; we sing and flutter about. I almost think that men were destined
to live in the trees."
"They only want wings," said the major.
"They will make them some day."
"In the meantime," replied Glenarvan, "permit me, my dear friend, to
prefer the sand of a park, the floor of a house, or the deck of a
vessel to this aerial abode."
"Glenarvan," said Paganel, "we must take things as they come. If
favorable, so much the better; if unfavorable, we must not mind it. I
see you long for the comforts of Malcolm Castle."
"No, but----"
"I am certain that Robert is perfectly happy," interrupted Paganel, to
secure one advocate, at least, of his theories.
"Yes, Monsieur Paganel!" cried the boy, in a joyful tone.
"It is natural at his age," replied Glenarvan.
"And at mine," added the geographer. "The less ease we have, the fewer
wants; the fewer wants, the happier we are."
"Well," said the major, "here is Paganel going to make an attack upon
riches and gilded splendor."
"No, my dear major," continued Paganel; "but, if you wish, I will tell
you, in this connection, a little Arab story that occurs to me."
"Yes, yes, Monsieur Paganel," cried Robert.
"And what will your story prove?" asked the major.
"What all stories prove, my brave companion."
"Not much, then," replied MacNabb. "But go on, Scheherezade, and tell
one of those stories that you relate so well."
"There was once upon a time," said Paganel, "a son of the great
Haroun-al-Raschid who was not happy. He accordingly consulted an old
dervish, who told him that happiness was a very difficult thing to
find in this world. 'However,' added he, 'I know an infallible way
to procure you happiness.' 'What is it?' inquired the young prince.
'It is,' replied the dervish, 'to put on the shirt of a happy man.'
Thereupon the prince embraced the old man, and set out in search of his
talisman. He visited all the capitals of the earth; he tried the shirts
of kings, emperors, princes, and nobles; but it was a useless task, he
was no happier. Then he put on the shirts of artists, warriors, and
merchants, but with no more success. He had thus traveled far, without
finding happiness. At last, desperate from having tried so many shirts,
he was returning very sadly one beautiful day to the palace of his
father, when he spied in the field an honest laborer, who was joyously
singing as he ploughed. 'Here is, at all events, a man who possesses
happiness,' said he to himself, 'or happiness does not exist on earth.'
He approached him. 'Good man,' said he, 'are you happy?' 'Yes,' replied
the other. 'You wish for nothing?' 'No.' 'You would not change your lot
for that of a king?' 'Never!' 'Well, sell me your shirt!' 'My shirt! I
have none!'"
[Illustration: They were agreed on this point, that it was necessary to
have courage for every fortune, and be contented with a tree when one
has neither palace nor cottage.]