the cause of this surprise?"

"Well! it is the fearful speed you will have to put on the Nautilus, if
the day after to-morrow she is to be in the Mediterranean, having made
the round of Africa, and doubled the Cape of Good Hope!"

"Who told you that she would make the round of Africa and double the
Cape of Good Hope, sir?"

"Well, unless the Nautilus sails on dry land, and passes above the
isthmus----"

"Or beneath it, M. Aronnax."

"Beneath it?"

"Certainly," replied Captain Nemo quietly. "A long time ago Nature
made under this tongue of land what man has this day made on its
surface."

"What! such a passage exists?"

"Yes; a subterranean passage, which I have named the Arabian Tunnel.
It takes us beneath Suez and opens into the Gulf of Pelusium."

"But this isthmus is composed of nothing but quick sands?"

"To a certain depth. But at fifty-five yards only there is a solid
layer of rock."

"Did you discover this passage by chance?" I asked more and more
surprised.

"Chance and reasoning, sir; and by reasoning even more than by chance.
Not only does this passage exist, but I have profited by it several
times. Without that I should not have ventured this day into the
impassable Red Sea. I noticed that in the Red Sea and in the
Mediterranean there existed a certain number of fishes of a kind
perfectly identical. Certain of the fact, I asked myself was it
possible that there was no communication between the two seas? If
there was, the subterranean current must necessarily run from the Red
Sea to the Mediterranean, from the sole cause of difference of level.
I caught a large number of fishes in the neighbourhood of Suez. I
passed a copper ring through their tails, and threw them back into the
sea. Some months later, on the coast of Syria, I caught some of my
fish ornamented with the ring. Thus the communication between the two
was proved. I then sought for it with my Nautilus; I discovered it,
ventured into it, and before long, sir, you too will have passed
through my Arabian tunnel!"

CHAPTER V

THE ARABIAN TUNNEL

That same evening, in 21 deg. 30' N. lat., the Nautilus floated on the
surface of the sea, approaching the Arabian coast. I saw Djeddah, the
most important counting-house of Egypt, Syria, Turkey, and India. I
distinguished clearly enough its buildings, the vessels anchored at the
quays, and those whose draught of water obliged them to anchor in the
roads. The sun, rather