Chapter 7 Chapter 7 On the Island

Ten minutes later, the Algerian governor and his "subjects" fell asleep in the stone house.However, not long after, the captain woke up suddenly again, his mind was always disturbed by a series of questions.There are a lot of strange things these days, what is the reason?Still in the dark.He knew little about astronomy, but when he tried to think about it, he also remembered some basic knowledge about astronomy that he had learned.He wondered whether these phenomena would occur if the Earth's axis were tilted in the direction of the ecliptic.However, although the tilt of the earth's axis can explain why the sea changes position, or why the east-west direction is reversed, it cannot explain why the day and night are greatly shortened, or why the gravity on the earth's surface suddenly weakens.Although he quickly gave up this view, he felt an indescribable discomfort in his heart because of the knowledge he had.As the saying goes, we have reached the end of the mountain, and we can no longer find any more decent arguments to explain these incredible phenomena.However, he hasn't explored all the strange things that emerge one after another.He thought that maybe one day he would discover a strange phenomenon and his mind would be enlightened, and all the problems would be solved suddenly.He looks forward to this day.

The next day, Ben-Zoff got up together and was busy preparing lunch.what else can we do?Must adapt to the new environment!He was so hungry that he was so hungry that he really wanted to swallow a dozen eggs at once.Although the natural disaster has shattered Algeria, Ben-Zov's appetite remains intact.Making some couscous is right up his alley, and it will be a delicious dish. The stove is in the stone house.The copper pot was also there, gleaming as if it had just been bought.There is clear water in the bucket, and there are still clouds of water vapor floating on the surface of the water.As soon as the water boils, just put the eggs in the pot and they will be cooked in three minutes.

The stove was quickly lit.Ben-Zoff habitually hummed a military tune: salt shaker Is there any salt? For braised pork, Where is the beef? Captain Servadak walked up and down the stone hut, watching Ben-Zov with curious eyes as he prepared lunch.He hopes to make new discoveries, so that all doubts will be solved.With this mentality, he wondered if he would discover anything new today.Will the stove burn as usual?The air has become quite thin, will there be enough oxygen to keep the fire burning? The stove ignited smoothly, and Ben-Zov blew lightly, and the dry wood pressed under the coals burst into red flames.Everything is normal.

The copper pot was already on the stove, and it was filled with water.Once the water boils, put the eggs into the pot.The egg held by Ben-Zoff was almost weightless, as if it was empty. However, in less than two minutes, the water boiled. "Damn it, this stove burns so fast!" cried Ben-Zoff. "It's not that the stove burns fast, but that the water boils fast!" Captain Servadac replied after thinking for a moment. As he spoke, he took off the thermometer hanging on the wall and put it into boiling water. The thermometer pointed to 70°C. "Strange thing? Now the water boils not at 100 degrees but at 70 degrees."

"Then what to do, Captain?" "I say you ought to let the eggs boil in the pan for a quarter of an hour. You may rest assured that, even if you cook them so long, they are only just hard-boiled!" "Won't it be overcooked?" "No, Ben-Zoff. It will still be quite tender, just good enough to dip bread in." Captain's Branch is exactly right.This is apparently caused by a drop in air pressure, which coincides with a decrease in the density of the air.When the water is boiled to 70 degrees, it will boil, which means that the air pressure on the earth's surface has dropped by about one-third.This situation is exactly the same as on the 1,100-meter mountain.If the captain had a barometer at hand, he would know exactly how much the pressure had dropped.It is for this reason.Their voices became lower, their breathing became more rapid, and the blood flow in their veins slowed down.However, they have gradually adapted to these changes.

"But," Captain Servadac murmured in his heart, "it's hard to say that we are on a mountain more than 1,000 meters high, because the roaring sea is right in front of our eyes." Although Selvadac's analysis of these phenomena is completely correct, he still has not found the real reason. The eggs were cooked a little longer in the boiling water, and the couscous was done.Ben Yizoff thought to himself that in the future, when cooking for the captain, it seems that he needs to start the stove an hour in advance, so as not to run out of time and make things messy. The captain ate big mouthfuls, and those endless questions were still circling in his mind.

"How is it, Captain?" Ben-Zoff asked.That was his catchphrase, and it was the way he always started whenever he wanted to talk to the Captain about anything. "What's the matter, my husband?" The captain always answered him with these words. "What do we do now?" "Wait patiently." "wait?" "Wait for someone to pick us up." "They must have come from the sea?" "Of course, we're on an isolated island now." "Captain, then you think your colleagues..." "I think, or at least I hope, that the disaster is limited to isolated areas of the Algerian coast and that my colleagues will be safe."

"Yes, Captain, we can only pin our hopes on them." "The governor will not be at peace when he sees such a calamity. He will send a ship from Algiers to find us here. I dare say he will not forget us all. So Ben-Zov, you have to pay more attention to the sea, and when you see a ship coming, signal it." "What if no boat comes?" "Then we'll build a boat ourselves and go find them." "Okay, Captain. So you know how to row?" "You can always learn if the situation requires it," replied the captain, in a firm and composed tone.

For the next few days, Ben-Zov kept looking at the seaside with his binoculars, but he didn't find a single boat. "Damn it," he cried impatiently, "the Governor must have forgotten us." As of January 6, they did not encounter any new cases.The so-called January 6 here refers to the old calendar, that is, the calendar before the day and night were shortened by half.Captain Servadac still used this old calendar.He was justified in doing so in order not to isolate himself mentally from the world.So although the sun had risen and set a dozen times over the isolated island, he considered that only six days had elapsed since that night of great change.Fortunately, his watch is running very well, which also provides convenience for him to continue to use the old calendar.Of course, if it is not a watch but a clock, then in the current situation, with the weakening of gravity, the movement of the pendulum will be disordered, and the timing will be inaccurate.But Selvadak now relies on a pocket watch driven by a clockwork, and gravity will not have any effect on it.Therefore, as long as his watch is of good quality, the movement will be as usual.And so it is.

"Captain," the imaginative Ben-Zov suddenly exclaimed, "I think your current situation is very similar to Robinson, but I am on that Friday! Have I become a black man?  … ..." "No," replied the captain, "you are still a handsome white man, only a little darker." "A white star," said Ben-Zoff, "that's a bit of a nonsense, but I think it's pretty good." By January 6, seeing that no one had come to rescue them, the captain felt that he had to act like Robinson first, and investigate the animal and plant resources on the island.

The island—they called it Gulby Island—was about three thousand square kilometers, or three hundred thousand hectares.There are flocks of cattle and sheep on the island, and a lot of game, but the exact number is difficult to find out.Various crops have grown in the fields, including wheat, corn and rice, which will be harvested in three months.There was therefore more than enough food for the captain and Ben-Zov, and fodder for the two horses.Even if some people come to settle on the island, the food supply can be guaranteed. From January 6th to 13th, it rained non-stop, and the sky was covered with dark clouds all day long, and there was no sign of clearing up.In addition, there were several torrential rains, which is really rare in January.At the same time, Captain Selvadak also found that the temperature had risen significantly.Logically speaking, it is still the middle of winter, but there is a scene of hot summer.What is even more surprising is that the temperature is not only always high, but also getting higher and higher. It seems that the earth is gradually approaching the sun. At the same time, the light became more intense. If the island had not been covered by a thick layer of dark clouds, the scene on the island would have been different. Dark clouds covered the sky so tightly that Servadac could not see what the sun, moon and other celestial bodies looked like.Otherwise, he may be able to see a little clue from it, so that his troubled questions can be answered.Therefore, he frowns all day long, with a surge of anger in his heart.Ben-Zoff tried to comfort him once or twice, telling him not to worry about himself, but to resign himself to fate like himself, but the captain pushed back hard.Afterwards, Ben-Zoff didn't say a word, except sleeping for a few hours every day, no matter it was windy or rainy, he stood guard on the rock day and night, looking out into the sea.Waited and watched for a few days, found nothing.Besides, the weather is so bad.How can there be any boats when the rain is so heavy?The sea was full of wind and rain, and the heights reached by the turbulent waves were simply unimaginable.Even at the beginning of the formation of the earth, when the water on the surface was first evaporated into the air by geothermal heat and then condensed into water and fell to the ground, the violent wind and rain would not be much stronger than it is now. On January 13, the storm stopped suddenly, and the remaining clouds in the sky were swept away by the strong wind that night.For six days, Captain Servadac had been living in his stone hut like a year.Now as soon as the wind and rain stopped, he walked out of the stone house and came to the rock.What will the sky be waiting for him? Will the gigantic star that only showed its face seen on the night of December 31 appear on the main line again?Would all the mysteries of the mysterious phenomena he had seen these days be revealed to him all at once? The sky was clear and cloudless.The countless stars hanging on the sky screen clearly caught his eyes like a huge celestial phenomenon.Some nebulae that astronomers couldn't see clearly without a telescope in the past are now showing their true colors. The captain's first thought was to see if the North Star was still there, because he was relatively expert at observing the North Star. Polaris is still hanging on the sky, but its position has been lowered a lot toward the horizon, and it seems that it is no longer the center of rotation of various celestial bodies.in other words.If the earth's axis is extended infinitely, then this extension line cannot pass through the fixed position that Polaris usually occupies in the sky.In fact, an hour later, Polaris had moved so visibly toward the horizon that it now appeared to be some object in the zodiacal constellation. What needs to be known now is which star has replaced it, that is to say which star occupies the position of the extended line of the earth's axis passing through the sky.Servadac watched intently for a long time.This new North Star should stay there like the original North Star, while the other stars revolve around it day and night. Later, Servadac finally discovered that in the sky not far from the northern sky, there was a star that did not move, and all the stars seemed to be revolving around it.The star is Vega in the Lyra constellation.Due to precession, it should have reached the original position of Polaris after 1200 years.In fact, however, only fourteen days have elapsed since the great change of that night, so it can only be assumed that the inclination of the Earth's wheels has changed suddenly. "It seems," thought Servadac, "not only that the inclination of the earth's axis has changed, but also that, since the extension of the earth's axis now points not far from the horizon, the Mediterranean Sea may have moved near the equator." He couldn't help but lost himself in thought, but still staring at the sky, his eyes gradually shifted from the constellation of Ursa Major - which has now passed through the ecliptic zone, only its tail appears on the horizon of the same color of water and sky - to some newly emerging stars in the southern sky. Star.It was the first time in his life that he had seen these stars. Ben-Zoff suddenly let out a cry of surprise: "Look, the moon!" "Moon?" Servadac woke up from his contemplation and asked dumbly. "Yes, the moon!" Ben-Zov rejoiced at being able to see this "companion of the night" so called in the poem. As he spoke, he pointed to a silver basin hanging on the sky.Its position is exactly the opposite of the position the sun should occupy at this time. Is it the moon or some other smaller planet that suddenly grows larger due to the shortened distance?Selvadak couldn't answer.He picked up the larger telescope he usually used in geodesy, and looked at the planet. "If it's really the moon," said the captain, "it's already very far away from us, not thousands of miles, but millions of miles." After careful observation, he decided that it could not be the moon, its dim light was not bright and soft.Not only did the plains and seas disappear from the surface of the planet, but also the lines of light and dark revealed by the majestic Tejie Mountains could not be seen. "No, it can't be the moon!" he said. "Why not?" asked Ben-Zoff, convinced of his discovery. "Because the planet also has a very small moon orbiting it." Indeed, a bright point of light, like the several satellites orbiting Jupiter, appears very clear to the telescope. "If it's not the moon, what could it be?" Servadac exclaimed impatiently, "but it can't be Venus and Mercury either, because neither of these stars has satellites. But their orbits are in the orbit of the earth." Inside, revolves around the sun. God! If it's not Venus and Mercury, it must be the moon, but where did the moon get a satellite?"