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Phileas Fogg

An enigmatic, wealthy English gentleman of about forty living at No. 7 Saville Row, London, in 1872. He is a member of the Reform Club, obsessively punctual and methodical, speaks little, and is of unknown origin and fortune. He wagers £20,000—half his fortune, held at Baring's bank—that he can circumnavigate the globe in eighty days or fewer.

Passepartout (Jean)

A good-natured, stocky French valet of about thirty, born in Paris, who enters Fogg's service on 2 October 1872, the very day of departure. His colourful past includes stints as an itinerant singer, circus acrobat, gymnastics professor, and Parisian fireman. He seeks a quiet, settled life but finds himself hurtled around the world instead, and carries Fogg's carpet-bag containing £20,000 in banknotes.

Fix

A small, slight, sharp-eyed detective dispatched from Scotland Yard to track a bank robber. He first appears at Suez watching passengers disembark from the Mongolia, convinced that Phileas Fogg is the man who stole £55,000 from the Bank of England. He is driven by impatience, self-conceit, and the prospect of a £2,000 reward, and shadows Fogg across multiple continents while awaiting a warrant of arrest from London.

Andrew Stuart

A member of the Reform Club whist circle and an engineer by profession. He is the most sceptical of Fogg's wager, arguing that unforeseen delays make the journey impossible, and is one of the five members who accepts Fogg's bet of £20,000.

Gauthier Ralph

One of the Directors of the Bank of England and a Reform Club whist partner of Fogg. He is optimistic that detectives will catch the bank robber and is among the five members who accept Fogg's wager.

James Forster

Fogg's previous domestic servant, dismissed on the morning of 2 October 1872 for delivering shaving water at 84 °F instead of the required 86 °F. His departure creates the vacancy filled by Passepartout.

Lord Albemarle

An elderly, paralytic nobleman who remains the last public backer of Fogg's wager after public opinion turns against it. He bets £5,000 on Fogg, declaring that if the feat is possible, an Englishman should be the first to accomplish it.

No. 7 Saville Row, Burlington Gardens, London

Phileas Fogg's London residence, the same house in which playwright Sheridan died in 1814. It is orderly, comfortable, and gas-lit, equipped with electric bells, speaking-tubes, and synchronised electric clocks. A printed daily programme governs every hour of household activity, and a fireproof safe holds Fogg's reserve funds.

The Reform Club, Pall Mall, London

An imposing club estimated to have cost three million pounds, situated in Pall Mall, where Fogg breakfasts, dines, reads newspapers, and plays whist daily at mathematically fixed hours. It possesses two libraries, lavish dining rooms, a mosaic-floored entrance hall, and a circular domed gallery. The wager that drives the plot is made and must be settled here.

Suez (and the Suez Canal)

A fast-growing Egyptian port town at the mouth of the canal engineered by M. Lesseps, cutting the old Cape of Good Hope route between England and India roughly in half. It is Fogg's first scheduled stop, where Fix takes up his watching post and where Fogg has his passport visaed to prove his passage.

Bombay (Mumbai), India

Fogg's next destination after Suez, reached by ten days' steamer voyage on the Mongolia. Fix intends to arrest Fogg here and telegraphs Scotland Yard for a warrant to be sent to the city. The Great Indian Peninsula Railway connects Bombay onward to Calcutta.

Charing Cross Railway Station, London

The London terminus from which Fogg and Passepartout depart by train toward Dover and Calais on the evening of 2 October 1872 at twenty minutes past eight, beginning the eighty-day journey.

The Reform Club Whist Circle

A group of five wealthy, respectable Reform Club members who accept Fogg's extraordinary wager: Andrew Stuart (engineer), John Sullivan and Samuel Fallentin (bankers), Thomas Flanagan (brewer), and Gauthier Ralph (Bank of England director). They collectively stake £20,000 against Fogg's £20,000 that he cannot circumnavigate the globe in eighty days.

The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company (P&O)

A major British steamship company whose vessels, including the fast iron steamer Mongolia, serve the route between Brindisi, Suez, and Bombay. The company awards speed prizes to ships that beat their scheduled times, and its timetables form a critical part of Fogg's itinerary.

Scotland Yard / Metropolitan Police

The London police authority, headed by Commissioner Rowan, which dispatches detectives—including Fix—to ports worldwide after the Bank of England robbery. Fix telegraphs Rowan from Suez requesting a warrant of arrest for Fogg to be sent to Bombay.

Phileas Fogg's Eighty-Day Itinerary

A precisely calculated route, originally published in the Daily Telegraph, covering London to Suez (7 days), Suez to Bombay (13 days), Bombay to Calcutta (3 days), Calcutta to Hong Kong (13 days), Hong Kong to Yokohama (6 days), Yokohama to San Francisco (22 days), San Francisco to New York (7 days), and New York to London (9 days), totalling exactly 80 days. Fogg keeps a personal notebook recording stipulated versus actual arrival times at each waypoint.

The Carpet-Bag with £20,000

A single modest travelling bag containing two shirts and three pairs of stockings each for Fogg and Passepartout, plus a large roll of Bank of England notes worth £20,000—half of Fogg's fortune. Fogg travels without trunks, intending to buy necessities along the way; Passepartout carries the bag throughout the journey.

Passepartout's Oversized Silver Watch

An enormous silver pocket watch inherited through Passepartout's family, still set permanently to London time. Because he refuses to adjust it to local solar time, it progressively falls behind the clocks of each country visited, providing both comic moments and a subtle motif about the relationship between time-keeping and travel.

Bradshaw's Continental Railway Steam Transit and General Guide

The standard Victorian traveller's reference book for railway and steamer timetables across Europe and beyond. Fogg carries a red-bound copy under his arm when departing Saville Row, using it to plan connections mathematically.

The SS Mongolia

An iron P&O steamer of 2,800 tons and 500 horsepower, plying the Brindisi–Suez–Bombay route and consistently beating the company's own speed requirements. It is the vessel on which Fogg, Passepartout, and Fix all travel from Suez toward Bombay, and on which the detective first suspects and watches his quarry.

The Bank of England Robbery

Three days before Fogg's departure, a package of banknotes worth £55,000 was stolen from the principal cashier's table at the Bank of England during a momentary lapse in attention. A well-dressed, polished gentleman was observed in the paying room at the time. Scotland Yard dispatched detectives to major ports worldwide and offered a reward of £2,000 plus five percent of any recovered sum. Detective Fix becomes convinced Fogg is the culprit, setting the story's pursuit plot in motion.

The Eighty-Day Wager

On 2 October 1872, Fogg bets £20,000 (half his fortune, deposited at Baring's) against five Reform Club members that he can circumnavigate the globe in eighty days or fewer, departing immediately. A signed memorandum records the terms; Fogg must return to the Reform Club by 21 December 1872 at a quarter to nine p.m. News of the bet spreads across London and England, spawning public betting, newspaper debates, and 'Phileas Fogg bonds' traded on the Exchange.

Victorian Global Transport Network

By 1872, a combination of railways and scheduled steamships had reduced the theoretical minimum time for a global circumnavigation to eighty days. Key enabling infrastructure includes the recently opened Suez Canal (shortcutting the Cape of Good Hope), the Great Indian Peninsula Railway (including the new Rothal–Allahabad section), the Pacific Railroad across North America, and the transatlantic steam mail services. Delays from weather, accidents, missed connections, or political unrest remain constant hazards.

Journey Departure Timeline

Wednesday 2 October 1872: Fogg dismisses Forster, hires Passepartout, makes the wager at the Reform Club, and departs London by train at 8.45 p.m. He reaches Paris on 3 October, Turin via Mont Cenis on 4 October, Brindisi on 5 October, sails on the Mongolia the same evening, and arrives at Suez on Wednesday 9 October at 11 a.m.—exactly on schedule, having spent 158.5 hours in transit. He must return to London by 21 December 1872.