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Around the World in 80

Days

Jules Verne

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Around the World in 80 Days

Chapter I

IN WHICH PHILEAS FOGG

AND PASSEPARTOUT

ACCEPT EACH OTHER, THE

ONE AS MASTER, THE

OTHER AS MAN

Mr. Phileas Fogg lived, in 1872, at No. 7, Saville Row,

Burlington Gardens, the house in which Sheridan died in

1814. He was one of the most noticeable members of the

Reform Club, though he seemed always to avoid

attracting attention; an enigmatical personage, about

whom little was known, except that he was a polished

man of the world. People said that he resembled Byron—

at least that his head was Byronic; but he was a bearded,

tranquil Byron, who might live on a thousand years

without growing old.

Certainly an Englishman, it was more doubtful whether

Phileas Fogg was a Londoner. He was never seen on

‘Change, nor at the Bank, nor in the counting-rooms of

the ‘City"; no ships ever came into London docks of

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which he was the owner; he had no public employment;

he had never been entered at any of the Inns of Court,

either at the Temple, or Lincoln’s Inn, or Gray’s Inn; nor

had his voice ever resounded in the Court of Chancery, or

in the Exchequer, or the Queen’s Bench, or the

Ecclesiastical Courts. He certainly was not a manufacturer;

nor was he a merchant or a gentleman farmer. His name

was strange to the scientific and learned societies, and he

never was known to take part in the sage deliberations of

the Royal Institution or the London Institution, the

Artisan’s Association, or the Institution of Arts and

Sciences. He belonged, in fact, to none of the numerous

societies which swarm in the English capital, from the

Harmonic to that of the Entomologists, founded mainly

for the purpose of abolishing pernicious insects.

Phileas Fogg was a member of the Reform, and that

was all.

The way in which he got admission to this exclusive

club was simple enough.

He was recommended by the Barings, with whom he

had an open credit. His cheques were regularly paid at

sight from his account current, which was always flush.

Was Phileas Fogg rich? Undoubtedly. But those who

knew him best could not imagine how he had made his

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Around the World in 80 Days

fortune, and Mr. Fogg was the last person to whom to

apply for the information. He was not lavish, nor, on the

contrary, avaricious; for, whenever he knew that money

was needed for a noble, useful, or benevolent purpose, he

supplied it quietly and sometimes anonymously. He was,

in short, the least communicative of men. He talked very

little, and seemed all the more mysterious for his taciturn

manner. His daily habits were quite open to observation;

but whatever he did was so exactly the same thing that he

had always done before, that the wits of the curious were

fairly puzzled.

Had he travelled? It was likely, for no one seemed to

know the world more familiarly; there was no spot so

secluded that he did not appear to have an intimate

acquaintance with it. He often corrected, with a few clear

words, the thousand conjectures advanced by members of

the club as to lost and unheard-of travellers, pointing out

the true probabilities, and seeming as if gifted with a sort

of second sight, so often did events justify his predictions.

He must have travelled everywhere, at least in the spirit.

It was at least certain that Phileas Fogg had not

absented himself from London for many years. Those who

were honoured by a better acquaintance with him than

the rest, declared that nobody could pretend to have ever

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Around the World in 80 Days

seen him anywhere else. His sole pastimes were reading

the papers and playing whist. He often won at this game,

which, as a silent one, harmonised with his nature; but his

winnings never went into his purse, being reserved as a

fund for his charities. Mr. Fogg played, not to win, but for

the sake of playing. The game was in his eyes a contest, a

struggle with a difficulty, yet a motionless, unwearying

struggle, congenial to his tastes.

Phileas Fogg was not known to have either wife or

children, which may happen to the most honest people;

either relatives or near friends, which is certainly more

unusual. He lived alone in his house in Saville Row,

whither none penetrated. A single domestic sufficed to

serve him. He breakfasted and dined at the club, at hours

mathematically fixed, in the same room, at the same table,

never taking his meals with other members, much less

bringing a guest with him; and went home at exactly

midnight, only to retire at once to bed. He never used the

cosy chambers which the Reform provides for its favoured

members. He passed ten hours out of the twenty-four in

Saville Row, either in sleeping or making his toilet. When

he chose to take a walk it was with a regular step in the

entrance hall with its mosaic flooring, or in the circular

gallery with its dome supported by twenty red porphyry

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