Tired of reading? Add this page to your Bookmarks or Favorites and finish it later.
|
|
"And I did well!" cried Andrew Speedy; "for I have gained at
least forty thousand dollars by it!" He added, more sedately,
"Do you know one thing, Captain--"
"Fogg."
"Captain Fogg, you've got something of the Yankee about you."
And, having paid his passenger what he considered a high compliment,
he was going away, when Mr. Fogg said, "The vessel now belongs to me?"
"Certainly, from the keel to the truck of the masts--all the wood, that is."
"Very well. Have the interior seats, bunks, and frames pulled down,
and burn them."
It was necessary to have dry wood to keep the steam up
to the adequate pressure, and on that day the poop, cabins,
bunks, and the spare deck were sacrificed. On the next day,
the 19th of December, the masts, rafts, and spars were burned;
the crew worked lustily, keeping up the fires. Passepartout hewed, cut,
and sawed away with all his might. There was a perfect rage for demolition.
The railings, fittings, the greater part of the deck, and top sides
disappeared on the 20th, and the Henrietta was now only a flat hulk.
But on this day they sighted the Irish coast and Fastnet Light.
By ten in the evening they were passing Queenstown. Phileas Fogg
had only twenty-four hours more in which to get to London;
that length of time was necessary to reach Liverpool, with all steam on.
And the steam was about to give out altogether!
|