Early in the morning on November 11, fresh air poured through the Nautilus's interior, informing me that we had returned to the surface of the ocean to renew our oxygen supply.

I headed for the central companionway and climbed onto the platform.

It was six o'clock. I found the weather overcast, the sea gray but calm. Hardly a billow. I hoped to encounter Captain Nemo there-would he come?

I saw only the helmsman imprisoned in his glass-windowed pilothouse.

Seated on the ledge furnished by the hull of the skiff, I inhaled the sea's salty aroma with great pleasure.

Little by little, the mists were dispersed under the action of the sun's rays.

The radiant orb cleared the eastern horizon. Under its gaze, the sea caught on fire like a trail of gunpowder.

Scattered on high, the clouds were colored in bright, wonderfully shaded hues, and numerous ladyfingers warned of daylong winds.

But what were mere winds to this Nautilus, which no storms could intimidate!

So I was marveling at this delightful sunrise, so life-giving and cheerful, when I heard someone climbing onto the platform.

I was prepared to greet Captain Nemo, but it was his chief officer who appeared-whom I had already met during our first visit with the captain.

He advanced over the platform, not seeming to notice my presence.

A powerful spyglass to his eye, he scrutinized every point of the horizon with the utmost care.

Then, his examination over, he approached the hatch and pronounced a phrase whose exact wording follows below.

I remember it because, every morning, it was repeated under the same circumstances. It ran like this:

Nautron respoc lorni virch.