The story starts in 1866. All over the world, people on ships see something strange in the sea. The strange thing is long and thin, and sometimes it glows in the water. It is much bigger and faster than a whale. Some people think it is a moving reef. Others say it could be a sea serpent.
The next year, in 1867, the strange thing attacks two ships. People become scared that the strange thing will attack other ships, so the United States government sends an expedition to look for the thing and find out what it is. The expedition group includes a French professor named Pierre Arronax. He thinks the strange thing might be a giant narwhal. Arronax's servant Conseil goes with him. A Canadian harpooner named Ned Land is also in the group.
The expedition sets sail on a ship, the "Abraham Lincoln" (named after Abraham Lincoln). After looking for some time, the expedition sees the strange thing. The thing attacks the "Abraham Lincoln". Arronax, Conseil, and Ned Land fall into the sea. They swim to the strange thing and climb onto it. They find that it is not a sea animal at all; it is a submarine, the "Nautilus". (The submarine is named after the nautilus, a sea creature that can rise and sink to different levels in the sea, just like a submarine).
Arronax, Conseil, and Ned Land meet the owner of the submarine, who calls himself Captain Nemo ("Nemo" is the Latin word for "nobody"). Nemo tells them that they will be prisoners on the submarine for the rest of their lives, because if he let them escape from the submarine, they would tell everybody about him. Ned Land is very angry to be a prisoner, and he starts making up plans to escape. Arronax is angry at first, but soon he finds that living in a submarine is fun; he is an expert on sea animals, and now he can look at them in their own habitat. As for Conseil, he just likes being a helpful servant, so he is happy as long as Arronax is happy.
Nemo takes his prisoners on a trip around the world, going through all of the world's oceans. They travel 43,200 miles, or 20,000 leagues (that is why the book is called "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea"). They have many adventures. But then Arronax discovers that Captain Nemo attacks some ships on purpose, to try to sink them. Nemo is trying to get revenge on a country that killed his family. But he will not say which country it is, or even where he came from.
Finally, the "Nautilus" gets stuck in the Maelstrom, a giant whirlpool in the Atlantic Ocean. Arronax, Conseil, and Ned Land finally escape and make it back to dry land. Arronax wonders whether Captain Nemo got out of the Maelstrom safely. He also wonders whether he will ever learn what Nemo's real name is, or where he came from. Most of all, Arronax hopes that Nemo will forgive his enemies and become a peaceful man, studying all the wonderful things under the sea. The story ends
Pierre-Jules Hetzel published the novel in a magazine he owned, the "Magazine of Education and Recreation" (). The story was serialized in issues of the magazine, beginning in March 1869 and ending in June 1870. After that, in 1871, Hetzel published it as a book, with more than a hundred illustrations by Alphonse de Neuville and Édouard Riou.
Stendhal
Henri-Marie Beyle (23 January 1783 – 23 March 1842) is better known by his pen name Stendhal. He was a 19th century French writer. He is known for his precise analysis of his characters' psychology. His two most famous novels are "Le Rouge et le Noir" ("The Red and the Black", 1830) and "La Chartreuse de Parme" ("The Charterhouse of Parma", 1839).
Stendhal was born in Grenoble. He died in Paris.
Travis Barker
Travis Landon Barker (born November 14, 1975) is an American drummer. He is better known for being in the band Blink-182. He is also the drummer for +44 and has several side projects such as Box Car Racer, Transplants and Expensive Taste.
Just before midnight on September 19, 2008, Barker and Adam "DJ AM" Goldstein were involved in a plane crash. Barker and Goldstein survived but the pilot, Sarah Lemmon, the co-pilot, James Bland, Chris Baker and security guard, Charles "Che" Still all died in the crash. Barker suffered both second and third degree burns that covered around 1/3 of his body.
Guy de Maupassant
Guy de Maupassant (5 August 1850 – 6 July 1893) was a popular 19th century French writer. He is considered one of the fathers of the modern short story.
He was an apprentice of Flaubert. Maupassant's stories have a common economy of style and their efficient, effortless dénouement (ending). Many of the stories are set during the Franco-Prussian War. Many more describe the war. He also wrote six short novels.
Prairie dog
Prairie dogs are a genus of ground squirrels. They are small, burrowing rodents which live in short-grass prairies and the high plains of western North America. The explorers Lewis and Clark sent a prairie dog to President Thomas Jefferson during their expedition; it was quite strange to him.
Prairie dogs are found in North America. In Mexico, they are mostly found in the northern states, which are the southern end of the great plains: northeastern Sonora, north and northeastern Chihuahua, northern Coahuila, northern Nuevo León, and northern Tamaulipas; in the U.S., they range primarily west of the Mississippi River, though they have also been introduced in a few eastern locales. They are also found in the Canadian Prairies. They will eat all sorts of vegetables and fruits.
Prairie dogs are mostly herbivores (plant-eaters). They eat grasses, seeds, leaves, flowers, fruit, eggs, and some insects.
Highly social, prairie dogs live in large colonies – collections of prairie dog families that can span hundreds of acres. Families usually are made up of one male and two to four females living in a strict social hierarchy. Prairie dog pups reach sexual maturity at about 3 years of age, and after their third winter the dominant male in a given family will drive them away, forcing them to establish their own families on the edges of the colony. The dominant male will defend the family's borders against rival prairie dogs, and disputes are resolved by fighting. Prairie dogs are also aggressive against predators such as badgers and snakes.
Prairie dogs are social animals, and often make social visits with each other, and greet each other with a sort of kiss. Prairie dogs employ a complex form of communication that involves barks and rhythmic chirps.
Prairie dog tunnel systems usually have several rooms. Tunnels can go down as far as , and can extend laterally as much as . Prairie dogs line their burrows with grass to insulate them, and the earth excavated from the burrow is piled up in mounds around the burrow's entrance. The prairie dogs use these carefully maintained mounds as observation posts.
The prairie dog is well adapted to predators. They can detect predators from a far distance and alert other prairie dogs to the danger with a special, high-pitched call. Prairie dogs use different calls to identify specific predators. Prairie dogs also trim the vegetation around their colonies, perhaps to remove any cover for predators. Their burrows generally contain several routes of escape.
The prairie dog is chiefly herbivorous, though it eats some insects. It feeds primarily on grasses and, in the fall, broadleaf plants. Prairie dogs have 1-6 pups (babies) yearly, which are born blind and furless and need about 30 days of close nurturing from their mother.
Sometimes two prairie dogs touch teeth with each other. Researchers think they do this as a way of recognizing each other.
Prairie dogs are hunted by many animals, including wolves, dogs, coyotes, bobcats, foxes, and humans.
The Hunchback of Notre Dame
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (, "Our Lady of Paris") is a 1831 French novel written by Victor Hugo. It is set in 1482 Paris. The story is about a Gypsy (Esmeralda), a bell-ringer in the cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris (Quasimodo) and the archdeacon (Claude Frollo).