The entire ship's crew were undergoing a nervous excitement, of which I can give no idea: they could not eat, they could not sleep -- twenty times a day, a misconception or an optical illusion of some sailor seated on the taff rail, would cause dreadful perspirations, and these emotions, twenty times repeated, kept us in a state of excitement so violent that a reaction was unavoidable; There remained, then, only two possible solutions of the question, which created two distinct parties: on one side, those who were for a monster of colossal strength; on the other, those who were for a submarine vessel of enormous motive power. Two days passed, the steam was at half pressure; a thousand schemes were tried to attract the attention and stimulate the apathy of the animal in case it should be met in those parts; remediable
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