Read Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious History of Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizatio Online

Authors: David Standish

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Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious History of Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizatio (10 page)

BOOK: Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious History of Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizatio
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In masking his quest as a sealing voyage, Symmes was both timely and strategic.
Symzonia
is an early specimen of American sea fiction, preceding James Fenimore Cooper’s
The Pilot
by three years. As the
Explorer
heads south, Symmes works hard at making the voyage realistic, providing specific detail that rings true. Until they reach the ice barrier,
Symzonia
might be another of the many seagoing journals that had been published over the years. They round Cape St. Roche, put in at Rio for provisions, and then stop for a month at the Falkland Islands, where Seaborn says he needs to recover “from the debility occasioned by the vexations and anxieties of business in these retrograde times”—might Symmes be thinking about his struggle to make a living trading with the Indians?—“and the pernicious habits of living, common among civilized men, upon food rendered palatable by a skilful admixture of poisons.” While cleaning up his system—to “regain the firm health so necessary to a man who undertakes great things,” he explains, modestly—Seaborn does a bit of touristic exploring of these wild dramatic islands, pronouncing them “salubrious.” A sealing party is dropped off on one of the outlying Jason Islands. When Seaborn returns two days later, he says, approvingly, that they had made good use of their time, “having cleared this island and all the neighboring keys … of the few seal which could be found.” They’re scarce because of other sealers before them. But no worries—there are many more farther south:
I concurred in the opinion published by Capt. Symmes, that seals, whales, and mackerel, come from the internal world through the openings at the poles; and was aware of the fact, that the nearer we approach those openings, the more abundant do we find seals and whales. I felt perfectly satisfied that I had only to find an opening in the “icy hoop,” through which I could dash with my vessel, to discover a region where seals could be taken as fast as they could be stripped and cured.
 
There’s a huge colony here of Gentoo penguins (distinguished by a white head stripe from eye to eye, a red-orange beak and feet), whose eggs are just waiting to be stolen and packed into salt barrels, tasty bar snacks for the trip. Symmes, revealing his inner birdwatcher, goes on for several pages about the Gentoo’s characteristics and habits, saying, “the contemplation of these orderly, discreet, and beautiful amphibia, afforded me much pleasure, and gave rise to many delightful anticipations.” He’s certain they’re “visiters [
sic
] from the internal world.” He notes their “remarkably gentle and harmless disposition,” from which “I inferred that the inhabitants of the internal world … must be of a remarkably pacific, and gentle disposition.”
The restorative month of R & R over, they’re once more heading south. They cruise by South Georgia Island but don’t stop because Seaborn is itching to get to the “verge.” He takes this interval as an opportunity to anticipate what they’ll find, per Symmes’ theories, of course. How seven months of sunlight and that greater refraction will make the pole warm. “I think if we can but find our way to the polar region, we shall be in much more danger of being roasted alive, than of being frozen to death.” Many of the crew buy into this, but Symmes provides his narrative with that most useful of stock characters, the grumbling doubter, in the form of Mr. Slim. He’s not having any. All previous expeditions have been stopped by
ice,
dammit! Seaborn explains at great length why, according to “that profound philosopher, John Cleve Symmes,” the “icy hoop” exists, and why he is certain that beyond it lies smooth sailing—the only trick is finding a way through. “We shipped with you, sir,” cries Slim, “for a sealing voyage; not for a voyage of discovery. You have no right to hazard our lives.” Slim says that even if we get through the icy hoop, what if we can’t get back? “We must in such a case all perish, and our blood would be upon your head.”
Seaborn wisely forbears telling Slim his real purpose, “of my belief of open poles, affording a practicable passage to the internal world, and of my confident expectations of finding comfortable winter quarters inside; for he would take that as evidence of my being insane.” That he would—just as most people did on hearing Symmes’ theories. Slim isn’t satisfied, and soon he’s busy drumming up interest in a mutiny. But just as they confront Seaborn, land is sighted, a large island crawling with seals. Its lee side provides a permanent break in the icy hoop. Seeing this, Slim backs down—for the moment. By acclaim this new country is named Seaborn’s Land. “The existence of a continent near the south pole, was thus fully established.” Chalk up another of the world’s mysteries solved by Seaborn. Two parties go ashore, one to spend several days exploring, the other to start sealing. When the exploring party gets back, having found timber, a mighty river, and a strange, enormous animal, the sealers have already racked up seven thousand skins and counting. Before leaving, Seaborn formally claims his new country for the United States. The claiming ceremony is all-American. He draws up a manifesto proclaiming that on November 5, 1817, he “did first see and discover this southern continent.” But then to assure permanency, “I had it engraved on a plate of sheathing copper, with a spread eagle at the top, and at the bottom a bank, with 100 dollar bills tumbling out of its doors and windows, to denote the amazing quantity and solidity of the wealth of my country.”
SECTIONAL VIEW OF THE EARTH,
 
SHOWING THE
 
OPENINGS AT THE POLES.
 
 
 
Map of the interior world from the original 1820 edition of
Symzonia.
All who can be spared go ashore, taking musical instruments, two pieces of cannon, wine, and grog. They bury the copper plate, covering it with a large stone engraved with “Seaborn’s Land, A.D. 1817,” put up a “liberty pole,” and Seaborn orders “a salute to be fired of one gun for every State.” What follows is a light commentary on the galloping Union circa 1820:
“How many will that be, sir?” asked Mr. Boneto, adding, that they came so fast he could not keep the run of them. Slim said it was twenty-one. I objected to that number, as being the royal salute of Great Britain, and settled the matter by telling them to fire away until they were tired of it, and finish off with a few squibs for the half-made states.
 
Then it’s on to the interior. Because the declivity of the “verge” is so gradual, the crew at first doesn’t realize they’re steaming into the interior world, and Seaborn is keeping his mouth shut. “No one knew which way we were steering but myself.” They lose sight of land, the compass goes crazy, and the sun sets briefly, causing alarm among the crew, but “the weather had been for some days so hot that a little night was very desirable.” They are inside. “We continued running due north,
internal,
three days.” At last, on November 28, they discover land, but to Seaborn’s disappointment, it is an island inhabited only by “terrapins of a monstrous size, some few seals, penguins, and numerous sea fowl.” But no people. “The great number of turtles was satisfactory evidence to my mind, that there were no human beings on the island.” Had there been, he implies without elaborating, all the turtles would have been eaten.
The crew is delighted and “complained of nothing but the excessive heat.” It’s almost too much for Seaborn. “The next morning I was quite sick, in consequence of the heat.” It becomes almost a running gag in this section, Symmes rubbing in the idea that it’s really warm at the pole. How hot is it? Seaborn becomes alarmed that the “excessive heat” may put them all in “great danger of the yellow fever making its appearance.” Reasoning that things will get cooler the farther in they go, he’s preparing to move on as fast as possible when the remains of a ship are discovered, a “wreck of some outlandish vessel” put together using “a white elastic wire” of an unknown substance. Seaborn plucks out some samples of “this singular material” and with them “fired the imagination of my people, by representing to them the enormous wealth we should acquire, could we obtain a cargo of it to carry to our country, where it would be more valuable than silver; and that the use to which it was applied was sufficient evidence of its being abundant where this vessel was built.” Even if this is a ruse to calm the fearful crew by filling their heads with money, the mental leap from finding the elastic wire to visions of its profit potential is immediate and seamless.
For a week they cruise farther into the interior, when Slim has another go at mutiny. We must be in some great hole in the earth, and the sun will disappear entirely—we will be engulfed in total darkness and never find our way out again! We have to turn back to Seaborn Land! If you refuse, we will throw you overboard! But Seaborn plays hard poker with them. If you do, he asks, who among you can find his way back? Oops. He assures them that he has no desire to perish in a sea of darkness either, that if they press on they can winter in a region far more pleasant than Seaborn’s Land. Let’s give it another two weeks; if we find nothing, we’ll turn back. But “should they persist in their mutinous course, I would break my instruments, throw my books overboard, and leave them to help themselves as they could.” All relent, Slim still grumbling.
Five days later they see a strange, five-masted ship and follow it into port. As the light is fading, Seaborn decides to anchor offshore until morning. Through his telescope he can see “buildings and moving objects on the land, which assured me that the country was inhabited.” Seaborn is nearly giddy with anticipation. He reflects:
I was about to reach the goal of all my wishes; to open an intercourse with a new world and with an unknown people; to unfold to the vain mortals of the external world new causes for the admiration of the infinite diversity and excellence of the works of an inscrutable Deity.
 
But then Symmes pulls back the curtain a little too far, revealing more than really might have been prudent, if understandable given the ridicule he suffered:
I was about to secure to my name a conspicuous and imperishable place on the tablets of History, and a niche of the first order in the temple of Fame. I moved like one who trod on air; for whose achievements had equalled mine? The voyage of Columbus was but an excursion on a fish pond, and his discoveries, compared with mine, were but trifles … His was the discovery of a continent, mine of a new World … I compared my doings and my sensations with those of that swarm of sordid beings who waste their lives in Wall-street, or in the purlieus of the courts intent on gain, and scrambling for the wrecks of the property of their unfortunate fellow beings, or hiring out the efforts of their minds to perform such loathsome work as their employers would pay them for;—men who feel themselves ennobled by their wealth; who think themselves superior to the useful classes of society; from whom I had often heard the scornful observation, “he is nothing but a shipmaster.”
 
This seems an outpouring straight from Symmes’ poor neglected heart, hidden away here deep in his manuscript. But if this is the prideful bitter nighttime of his soul, the next chapter opens with a sunrise, and with it a far rosier outlook. He awakes to see
gently rolling hills within an easy sloping shore, covered with verdure, checquered with groves of trees and shrubbery, studded with numerous white buildings, and animated with groups of men and cattle, all standing in relief near the foot of a lofty mountain, which in the distance reared its majestic head above the clouds … here there was nothing wanting to a perfect landscape.
 
It’s a scene that could have been lifted directly from Thomas Jefferson’s dreams, an ideal pastoral nineteenth-century vista. And even before setting foot there, unconcerned that the locals might possibly have their own name for their country, Seaborn immediately christens it Symzonia, “out of gratitude to Capt. Symmes for his sublime theory.” Can anyone doubt that Symmes wrote this?
Seaborn puts on his “best go-ashore clothes,” and with the “stripes and stars waving over the stern of the boat,” he goes to meet the Symzonians. Up until this point,
Symzonia
has been a passable adventure story; but now it becomes a utopian fiction, with all the attendant pitfalls—tedious patches devoted to a faux anthropological look at the perfect Symzonian society. The story grinds to a halt as we learn far more about their customs than we really need. Much of it seems inspired by Thomas More’s
Utopia
(1516).
BOOK: Hollow Earth: The Long and Curious History of Imagining Strange Lands, Fantastical Creatures, Advanced Civilizatio
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