Page:Works of Jules Verne - Parke - Vol 14.djvu/13

 THE AURORA AT THE SOUTHERN POLE. Firstly, a few days after our departure from the land of the Sphinx, the sun set behind the western horizon to reappear no more for the whole winter. It was then in the midst of the semi-darkness of the austral night that the Paracuta pursued her monotonous course. True, the southern polar lights were frequently visible; but they were not the sun, that single orb of day which had illumined our horizons during the months of the Antarctic summer, and their capricious splendor could not replace his unchanging light. That long darkness of the poles shed a moral and physical influence on mortals which no one can elude, a gloomy and overwhelming impression almost impossible to resist.—Page 388. Vol. 14.