"Jules Verne. Off on a Comet. WORKS" - читать интересную книгу автора

But what struck the explorers more than anything was the appearance
of singular newness that pervaded the whole of the region.
It all seemed so recent in its formation that the atmosphere had had no
opportunity of producing its wonted effect in softening the hardness
of its lines, in rounding the sharpness of its angles, or in modifying
the color of its surface; its outline was clearly marked against the sky,
and its substance, smooth and polished as though fresh from a founder's mold,
glittered with the metallic brilliancy that is characteristic of pyrites.
It seemed impossible to come to any other conclusion but that the land
before them, continent or island, had been upheaved by subterranean
forces above the surface of the sea, and that it was mainly composed
of the same metallic element as had characterized the dust so frequently
uplifted from the bottom.

The extreme nakedness of the entire tract was likewise very extraordinary.
Elsewhere, in various quarters of the globe, there may be sterile rocks,
but there are none so adamant as to be altogether unfurrowed by the filaments
engendered in the moist residuum of the condensed vapor; elsewhere there may
be barren steeps, but none so rigid as not to afford some hold to vegetation,
however low and elementary may be its type; but here all was bare, and blank,
and desolate--not a symptom of vitality was visible.

Such being the condition of the adjacent land, it could hardly be
a matter of surprise that all the sea-birds, the albatross, the gull,
the sea-mew, sought continual refuge on the schooner; day and night
they perched fearlessly upon the yards, the report of a gun failing
to dislodge them, and when food of any sort was thrown upon the deck,
they would dart down and fight with eager voracity for the prize.
Their extreme avidity was recognized as a proof that any land where they
could obtain a sustenance must be far remote.

Onwards thus for several days the _Dobryna_ followed the contour of
the inhospitable coast, of which the features would occasionally change,
sometimes for two or three miles assuming the form of a simple arris,
sharply defined as though cut by a chisel, when suddenly the prismatic
lamellae soaring in rugged confusion would again recur; but all along
there was the same absence of beach or tract of sand to mark its base,
neither were there any of those shoals of rock that are ordinarily found
in shallow water. At rare intervals there were some narrow fissures, but not
a creek available for a ship to enter to replenish its supply of water;
and the wide roadsteads were unprotected and exposed to well-nigh every
point of the compass.

But after sailing two hundred and forty miles, the progress of the _Dobryna_
was suddenly arrested. Lieutenant Procope, who had sedulously inserted
the outline of the newly revealed shore upon the maps, announced that it
had ceased to run east and west, and had taken a turn due north,
thus forming a barrier to their continuing their previous direction.
It was, of course, impossible to conjecture how far this barrier extended;
it coincided pretty nearly with the fourteenth meridian of east longitude;