The sphinx of the ice fields by Jules Verne

First of all I think it is necessary to remark that this story is a sequel of Edgar
Allan Poes book: The Adventures of Arthur Gordon Pym, because theres a
part in the summary that if you dont know that comes from another book you
will probably get lost.
Mr. Jeorling, an wealthy American citizen is doing research about wildlife on the
Kerguelen Islands but eventually he starts hating cold weather and lonely he is
involved in, so he look for the first chance to come back to home, it is in 1839.
So the first ship that arrives to the Island was The Halbrane, in charge of
Captain Len Guy. Late Mr Jeorling persuades this captain to take him to Tristan
da Cunha Island.
While the trip Mr. Jeorling who was a great fan of The Adventure of Arthur
Gordon Pym, and actually though that the story was true, talks to the captain
who shows a great interesting and a vast knowledge about it too. Then a sea
man seems to see a floating body in the water. The crew take it to board and
discovers that this is the death body of a sailor from The Jane, the supposed
ship of the story of Arthur Gordon Pym, but not only get impressed by it but the
find a letter in its clothing that indicates that he and several others
including Jane's captain William Guy had survived the assassination attempt at
Tsalal and are still alive. Because the book apparently tells that they were
murdered at that island. Then captain Len guy make a surprising revelation,
Captain William Guy from the books story was actually his brother so, the tale
is true.

Due to last events, they all decided to find and rescue the survivors from The
Jane. They go to take provisions at Falklands Islands where a mysterious man,
Martin Hunt, join to their trip who were excited to take part in the rescue
because of unknown reasons. Extraordinarily mild weather allows The Halbrane
to make good progress, and they break the pack ice barrier which surrounds an
Antarctic ocean without ice, it was early in summer. They find first Bennets
islet where according to the story, The Jane, Made a stop and after few weeks
they reach Tsalal Islands. But something weird has gone on, apparently a
recent earthquake devastated the whole place, eventually they find lots of
remains of Tsalals natives who died before the event but theres not a single
trace of The Jane and its crew.
They were extremely disappointed at this point but the mysterious man who
have joined them recently, Martin Hunt, reveal his true identity. He is Dirk
Peters, one of the sailors of The Jane, who obviously could survive and come
back safely. This strange revelation motivates everyone to keep going with the
search. Peters tells them that Pym and himself came back to the States, their
home, but only Peters instigated the publication of their voyage and never
listen about Pym again, even he heard that some says that he went to rescue
the people who left behind at Tsalal island. Peters since he were in home, he
changed his identity because he was too ashamed of having witness
cannibalism in their times of need.
Guy and Peters to continue further south, but many man leaded by Hearne,
dont think is a good idea. Some days later, the Halbrane, suffer a freak
accident. The ship is taken out from the water and stuck by an iceberg, the

whole ship is destroyed but there is only one boat left that eventually is taken
by Hearne and the men who disagrees with captains decision of continuing.
However they got luck, as they see a small boat of aboriginal style drifting by.
Peters is the first to react as he swims out towards the boat and secures it. But
Peters finds more, in the boat, there are captain William Guy and the four
surviving sea men of his crew, semiconscious and close to death. Peters brings
them ashore, and the men from Halbrane nurse them back to life.
Then William Guy recounts their story. They took a dog with them, Tiger was its
name, So at the natives Islands tiger bit many people and unfortunately the
dog got rabies, so people from there start to died one by one. Left people travel
to near islands to be safe from this danger, and the ones who were left behind
eventually died with a devastating earthquake. Up to this point, William Guy
and his men had lived fairly comfortably on Tsalal, but after the quake found
their position untenable and made a desperate attempt in the native boat to
escape north.
The combined crews of Halbrane and Jane decide to try to make it north in
native boat. They make good advance, until they notice the appearance of
strong magnetic fields. They find the source of it, the Ice Sphinx which is a
huge mountain magnetically charged by the particle streams that focusses on
the poles through Earth's magnetic field.
Here, they find the remains of Hearne's team, which came to grief when the Ice
Sphinx' great magnetic forces attracted their iron tools and boat components to
it and smashed them on its rocks. The boat of Joerling , Guy brothers and the
others escaped destruction because, being built by the natives, it has no iron

parts. At the foot of the sphinx, they also find the body of Pym, who dead in the
same way. The others come back again in their boat, and finally reach the open
ocean and are rescued.
Opinion
I found this story particularly fascinated since it was written by Jules Verne who
is famous because of his fiction books. But is fascinating how Verne adapts the
original book by Edgar Allan Poe and gives it a surprising but expected ending.
I think that it is expected because Jules Verne liked to write about tales that
involves magnetism or mysterious zones of the planet, so somehow it is a
typically ending for his books.
Despite I remark it is predictable, the whole plot of story is really absorbing and
I enjoy that part where the crew of The Jane are found alive and recount
everybody their story. It was awesome.