A Winter in the Klondike . . 169

2. The Dying Man's Tale.. 181

3. The Aftermath of a Secret. . 192

4. Circle City. . 205

5. A Journey of Discovery .. 216

6. Fort McPherson . . 226

7. Golden Mount . . 236

8. An Engineer's Bold Plan .. 247

9. The Moose Hunt .. 259

so. Mortal Dread.. 273

i i. On the Defensive . . 285

12. Attack and Defense. . 298

13. The Eruption . . 309

14. From Dawson City to Montreal .. 320

Notes.. 331

Olivier Dumas

IN 1886, AFTER PUBLISHING about thirty novels in the series Extraordinary Voyages, Jules Verne was at the pinnacle of his renown. During that year, however, he suffered a number of misfortunes: a bullet fired by his nephew left him with a limp that would remain for the rest of his life, and his publisher, Pierre-Jules Hetzel, died. A new life was beginning for the novelist: he had to give up sailing-his great passionand now that he felt free of the restrictions placed on him by Hetzel, he began to rethink his literary career.

Verne dreamed of breaking out of the "scientific and geographical" framework in which he was "condemned to operate."' As he grew older, he wrote gothic novels (The Sphinx of the Ice, The Yarns of Jean-Marie Cabidoulin), novels of passion (The Castle in the Carpathians), and satirical novels (Topsy Tu)-vy), but these works, though appreciated today for their literary value, were not well received at the time. What readers wanted above all from the author of From the Earth to the Moon was science fiction featuring extraordinary inventions.

Jules Verne's Posthumous Manuscripts

After the death of Jules Verne on March 24, 1905, his son Michel immediately drew up a list of eleven unpublished volumes. These works consisted of a travel story (Journey to England and Scotland), a futuristic novel (Paris in the Twentieth Century), a collection of short stories, and eight completed novels: The Lighthouse at the End of the World, The Thompson Travel Agency, In the Magellanes, The Secret of Wilhelm Storitz, The Hunt for the Meteor, The Danube Pilot, The Golden Volcano, and Study Trip.