Frankenstein's pursuit of the monster

After the murder of his wife Elizabeth, Victor Frankenstein's life contracted to a single, all-consuming purpose: the destruction of the monster he had created. His first resolution was to quit Geneva forever; his country, once dear to him in happiness, became hateful in his adversity. He provided himself with a sum of money and a few jewels that had belonged to his mother, and departed. His wanderings, which were to cease only with his life, had begun. He has traversed a vast portion of the earth and endured all the hardships that travellers in deserts and barbarous countries are wont to meet. Many times he stretched his failing limbs upon the sandy plain and prayed for death, but revenge kept him alive; he dared not die and leave his adversary in being.

The Oath and the First Pursuit

Before leaving Geneva, Victor went to the cemetery where William, Elizabeth, and his father reposed. He entered and approached the tomb that marked their graves. Everything was silent except the leaves of the trees, gently agitated by the wind; the night was nearly dark. The deep grief this scene excited quickly gave way to rage and despair. They were dead, and he lived; their murderer also lived, and to destroy him Victor must drag out his weary existence. He knelt on the grass, kissed the earth, and with quivering lips swore a solemn oath: "By the sacred earth on which I kneel, by the shades that wander near me, by the deep and eternal grief that I feel, I swear; and by thee, O Night, and the spirits that preside over thee, to pursue the daemon who caused this misery, until he or I shall perish in mortal conflict." He called on the spirits of the dead and the wandering ministers of vengeance to aid and conduct him in his work. He was answered through the stillness of night by a loud and fiendish laugh that rang on his ears long and heavily; the mountains re-echoed it. A well-known and abhorred voice, apparently close to his ear, addressed him in an audible whisper: "I am satisfied, miserable wretch! You have determined to live, and I am satisfied." Victor darted towards the spot from which the sound proceeded, but the devil eluded his grasp. Suddenly the broad disk of the moon arose and shone full upon the monster's ghastly and distorted shape as he fled with more than mortal speed.

The Global Chase

Victor pursued the monster for many months. Guided by a slight clue, he followed the windings of the Rhone, but vainly. The blue Mediterranean appeared, and by a strange chance, he saw the fiend enter by night and hide himself in a vessel bound for the Black Sea. Victor took passage in the same ship, but the monster escaped, he knew not how. Amidst the wilds of Tartary and Russia, although the monster still evaded him, Victor ever followed in his track. Sometimes the peasants, scared by the horrid apparition, informed him of the monster's path; sometimes the monster himself, who feared that if Victor lost all trace of him he would despair and die, left some mark to guide him. The snows descended on Victor's head, and he saw the print of the monster's huge step on the white plain. Cold, want, and fatigue were the least pains he was destined to endure; he was cursed by some devil and carried about with him his eternal hell. Yet still a spirit of good followed and directed his steps, and when he most murmured would suddenly extricate him from seemingly insurmountable difficulties. Sometimes, when nature, overcome by hunger, sank under the exhaustion, a repast was prepared for him in the desert that restored and inspirited him. Often, when all was dry, the heavens cloudless, and he was parched by thirst, a slight cloud would bedim the sky, shed the few drops that revived him, and vanish. Victor followed, when he could, the courses of the rivers, but the daemon generally avoided these, as it was here that the population of the country chiefly collected. In other places human beings were seldom seen, and Victor generally subsisted on the wild animals that crossed his path. He had money with him and gained the friendship of the villagers by distributing it; or he brought with him some food that he had killed, which, after taking a small part, he always presented to those who had provided him with fire and utensils for cooking.

The Monster's Taunts and the Arctic Journey

Victor's life, as it passed thus, was indeed hateful to him, and it was during sleep alone that he could taste joy. During the day he was sustained and inspirited by the hope of night, for in sleep he saw his friends, his wife, and his beloved country; again he saw the benevolent countenance of his father, heard the silver tones of Elizabeth's voice, and beheld Clerval enjoying health and youth. At such moments vengeance, that burned within him, died in his heart, and he pursued his path towards the destruction of the daemon more as a task enjoined by heaven than as the ardent desire of his soul. The monster sometimes left marks in writing on the barks of the trees or cut in stone that guided Victor and instigated his fury. "My reign is not yet over" — these words were legible in one of these inscriptions — "you live, and my power is complete. Follow me; I seek the everlasting ices of the north, where you will feel the misery of cold and frost, to which I am impassive. You will find near this place, if you follow not too tardily, a dead hare; eat and be refreshed. Come on, my enemy; we have yet to wrestle for our lives, but many hard and miserable hours must you endure until that period shall arrive." As Victor still pursued his journey to the northward, the snows thickened and the cold increased in a degree almost too severe to support. The peasants were shut up in their hovels, and only a few of the most hardy ventured forth. The rivers were covered with ice, and no fish could be procured. The triumph of his enemy increased with the difficulty of his labours. One inscription that the monster left was in these words: "Prepare! Your toils only begin; wrap yourself in furs and provide food, for we shall soon enter upon a journey where your sufferings will satisfy my everlasting hatred." Victor's courage and perseverance were invigorated by these scoffing words; he resolved not to fail in his purpose, and calling on heaven to support him, he continued with unabated fervour to traverse immense deserts, until the ocean appeared at a distance and formed the utmost boundary of the horizon. Covered with ice, it was only to be distinguished from land by its superior wildness and ruggedness. Victor knelt down and with a full heart thanked his guiding spirit for conducting him in safety to the place where he hoped to meet and grapple with his adversary.

The Final Confrontation and Death

Some weeks before this period Victor had procured a sledge and dogs and thus traversed the snows with inconceivable speed. He found that he now gained on the monster, so much so that when he first saw the ocean the monster was but one day's journey in advance. With new courage he pressed on, and in two days arrived at a wretched hamlet on the seashore. The inhabitants told him that a gigantic monster had arrived the night before, armed with a gun and many pistols, putting to flight the inhabitants of a solitary cottage. He had carried off their store of winter food, and placing it in a sledge, to draw which he had seized on a numerous drove of trained dogs, he had harnessed them, and the same night had pursued his journey across the sea in a direction that led to no land. On hearing this information Victor suffered a temporary access of despair. He exchanged his land-sledge for one fashioned for the inequalities of the frozen ocean, and purchasing a plentiful stock of provisions, he departed from land. He cannot guess how many days have passed since then, but he has endured misery which nothing but the eternal sentiment of a just retribution burning within his heart could have enabled him to support. Immense and rugged mountains of ice often barred up his passage, and he often heard the thunder of the ground sea, which threatened his destruction. By the quantity of provision he had consumed, he guessed that he had passed three weeks in this journey. Once, after the poor animals that conveyed him had with incredible toil gained the summit of a sloping ice mountain, and one, sinking under his fatigue, died, he viewed the expanse before him with anguish, when suddenly his eye caught a dark speck upon the dusky plain. He strained his sight to discover what it could be and uttered a wild cry of ecstasy when he distinguished a sledge and the distorted proportions of a well-known form within. He disencumbered the dogs of their dead companion, gave them a plentiful portion of food, and after an hour's rest continued his route. The sledge was still visible, and he indeed perceptibly gained on it, and when, after nearly two days' journey, he beheld his enemy at no more than a mile distant, his heart bounded within him. But when he appeared almost within grasp of his foe, his hopes were suddenly extinguished. A ground sea was heard; the thunder of its progress, as the waters rolled and swelled beneath him, became every moment more ominous and terrific. The wind arose; the sea roared; and, as with the mighty shock of an earthquake, it split and cracked with a tremendous and overwhelming sound. In a few minutes a tumultuous sea rolled between him and his enemy, and he was left drifting on a scattered piece of ice that was continually lessening and thus preparing for him a hideous death. In this manner many appalling hours passed; several of his dogs died, and he himself was about to sink under the accumulation of distress when he saw Walton's vessel riding at anchor and holding forth to him hopes of succour and life. He quickly destroyed part of his sledge to construct oars, and by these means was enabled, with infinite fatigue, to move his ice raft in the direction of the ship. He had determined, if the ship was going southwards, still to trust himself to the mercy of the seas rather than abandon his purpose. But Walton's direction was northwards. Victor was taken on board when his vigour was exhausted, and he would soon have sunk under his multiplied hardships into a death which he still dreaded, for his task was unfulfilled. On Walton's ship, Victor's health declined daily. He died after telling his story, his final words a warning to Walton to seek happiness in tranquillity and avoid ambition. The monster, appearing in Victor's cabin, mourned his creator and then vowed to die, springing from the cabin window onto an ice raft and being borne away by the waves, lost in darkness and distance.