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THE WATERY WONDERS of CAPTAIN NEMO 169 ULES VERNE’S 20,000 Source of Power

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THE WATERY WONDERS of CAPTAIN NEMO 169 ULES VERNE’S 20,000 Source of Power ULES VERNE’S 20,000 source of power. In none of these Leagues under the Sea was technical situation did Verne J published in 1869. Since take advantage of knowledge then we have heard a great deal readily available to him at the about the excellence of the sci- time. It is as if he sat in his chair ence, speculation and prediction and dashed off his concepts with- it contains. People seem to feel out bothering to get up and check that Verne’s sound scientific spec- facts that must have been in ulation makes the novel good books in the same room with him. science fiction, even though they He spun his yarn from the mate- may not care much for it as a rial in his head. And there you straight story. have a clue to the real value of But these days the waters are the novel. full of SCUBA divers. (The word Verne was a mighty story-tel- “SCUBA,” as most people are be- ler. His science was bad, his ginning to know, is made by tak- speculation absurd, and even his ing the first letter in each word of plot and his characters might be the phrase “Self-Contained Un- poor. No matter. Put them all to- derwater Breathing Apparatus.”) gether with the magic of Verne’s SCUBA divers carry their own air story-telling ability, and some- down into water as deep as three thing flames up. A story emerges hundred feet in lakes, oceans, that sweeps incredulity before it. streams, rivers, bays, quarries and caves all over the world. There is TT is a very difficult thing to a rash of books on the subject, read this novel in a hostile and many SCUBA divers are frame of mind, looking for the THE WATEEY WONDEES fairly well-versed in the history of blunders, noting all the scientific man’s descent beneath the water. misinformation. For one thing, OF CAPTAIN NEMO When a SCUBA diver takes a Verne uses a nifty device for pre- critical look at 20,000 Leagues senting much of the so-called under the Sea, a new interpreta- scientific data in the novel. He By THEODORE L. THOMAS tion of the novel emerges. will have one of the characters, The novel isn’t at all what liter- say the narrator, Professor Aron- This isn't fiction. ary critics have said it is. nax, poised on the brink of some It concerns the legends all of us have heard about The diving gear and the diving exciting event, and then he will the uncanny predictions of J. Verne, Esq. scenes are technically pretty bad, ladle in the scientific nonsense. behind the times even for 1869. In this posture of the story, who Most of them are! The submarine Nautilus itself is stops to think about science? out of date for 1869, with the sole Verne can get away with almost exception that electricity is the anything, and he does. THE WATERY WONDERS OF CAPTAIN NEMO 169 ULES VERNE’S 20,000 source of power. In none of these Leagues under the Sea was technical situation did Verne J published in 1869. Since take advantage of knowledge then we have heard a great deal readily available to him at the about the excellence of the sci- time. It is as if he sat in his chair ence, speculation and prediction and dashed off his concepts with- it contains. People seem to feel out bothering to get up and check that Verne’s sound scientific spec- facts that must have been in ulation makes the novel good books in the same room with him. science fiction, even though they He spun his yarn from the mate- may not care much for it as a rial in his head. And there you straight story. have a clue to the real value of But these days the waters are the novel. full of SCUBA divers. (The word Verne was a mighty story-tel- “SCUBA,” as most people are be- ler. His science was bad, his ginning to know, is made by tak- speculation absurd, and even his ing the first letter in each word of plot and his characters might be the phrase “Self-Contained Un- poor. No matter. Put them all to- derwater Breathing Apparatus.”) gether with the magic of Verne’s SCUBA divers carry their own air story-telling ability, and some- down into water as deep as three thing flames up. A story emerges hundred feet in lakes, oceans, that sweeps incredulity before it. streams, rivers, bays, quarries and caves all over the world. There is TT is a very difficult thing to a rash of books on the subject, read this novel in a hostile and many SCUBA divers are frame of mind, looking for the THE WATEEY WONDEES fairly well-versed in the history of blunders, noting all the scientific man’s descent beneath the water. misinformation. For one thing, OF CAPTAIN NEMO When a SCUBA diver takes a Verne uses a nifty device for pre- critical look at 20,000 Leagues senting much of the so-called under the Sea, a new interpreta- scientific data in the novel. He By THEODORE L. THOMAS tion of the novel emerges. will have one of the characters, The novel isn’t at all what liter- say the narrator, Professor Aron- This isn't fiction. ary critics have said it is. nax, poised on the brink of some It concerns the legends all of us have heard about The diving gear and the diving exciting event, and then he will the uncanny predictions of J. Verne, Esq. scenes are technically pretty bad, ladle in the scientific nonsense. behind the times even for 1869. In this posture of the story, who Most of them are! The submarine Nautilus itself is stops to think about science? out of date for 1869, with the sole Verne can get away with almost exception that electricity is the anything, and he does. THE WATERY WONDERS OF CAPTAIN NEMO 169 The power of Verne’s story- novel are those which describe the Nemo says, when he first de- the bottom of the sea, was obliged telling ability shows up in another activities of the characters as they scribes the diving apparatus to to shut my head, like that of a odd way. After reading the novel, roam on the bottom of the sea in Professor Aronnax, “It is to use diver, in a ball of copper.” This people remember things from it their SCUBA gear. Verne was not the Rouquayrol apparatus, in- was nothing new, either. The that are not there. The impres- concerned with many of the dan- vented by two of your own coun- closed-helmet diving dress had sion that the novel contains valid gers guarded against by modern trymen, which I have brought to been in steady use since its inven- scientific prediction seems to SCUBA divers, things like air em- perfection for my own use.” The tion by Augustus Siebe in 1840 grow as the years roll by. Re- bolism, nitrogen narcosis and the two “countrymen” are Rouquay- ... a diving dress so good that cently, a United States Patent bends. That’s all right. Diving was rol, a mining engineer, and Den- nothing more than refinements Office official received an inter- not sufficiently far advanced for ayrouze, a Navy officer. Their have been added to it to this very esting inquiry. Was it true that a these things to be of concern. It SCUBA gear was in use in 1865, day. Verne adds an innovation to patent examiner had rejected the wasn’t until the 1870s that the four years before Verne published the helmet in the novel. “In the patent application of an inventor Frenchman Paul Bert completed his novel. In the actual gear, an Rouquayrol apparatus such as of a new periscope because of the the 1660 work of the Englishman air hose ran from a compressor on we use, two india-rubber pipes periscope described by Jules Robert Boyle. Bert put out a book the surface down to a tank car- leave this box and join a sort of Verne in 20,000 Leagues under on diving physiology describing ried on the driver’s back. A second tent which holds the nose and the Sea? Well, the fact is that how nitrogen can bubble out of a hose ran from the tank to a mouth; one is to introduce fresh Verne is totally silent on the sub- diver’s blood when the diver mouthpiece through which the air, and the other to let out the ject of periscopes in the novel. comes up too fast. Bert was the diver breathed. Some kind of foul, and the tongue closes one The Nautilus had no periscope. man who pointed out the ways to valve on the tank fed the com- or the other according to the Another mis-remembered de- avoid the bends. The diver could pressed air to the mouthpiece at wants of the respirator.” scription concerns the storage bat- recompress in a chamber at the a pressure about equal to the Apparently Verne was not teries used aboard the Nautilus. surface in order to relieve the pressure of the water at that aware of the existence of check There are none. The only time pressure slowly and at will, or the depth. Once the diver’s tank was valves, so he requires that the Verne specifically mentions a bat- diver could come up slowly and charged, the diver could unplug diver use his tongue to control the tery is in connection with diving in stages.
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