by Jules Verne
CHAPTER XVIII.
GRAVE QUESTIONS.
But the projectile had passed the enceinte of Tycho, and Barbicane andhis two companions watched with scrupulous attention the brilliant rayswhich the celebrated mountain shed so curiously all over the horizon.
What was this radiant glory? What geological phenomenon had designedthese ardent beams? This question occupied Barbicane's mind.
Under his eyes ran in all directions luminous furrows, raised at the edgesand concave in the centre, some twelve miles, others thirty miles broad.These brilliant trains extended in some places to within 600 miles ofTycho, and seemed to cover, particularly towards the east, the northeastand the north, the half of the southern hemisphere. One of these jetsextended as far as the circle of Neander, situated on the 40th meridian.Another by a slight curve furrowed the Sea of Nectar, breaking againstthe chain of Pyrenees, after a circuit of 800 miles. Others, towards thewest, covered the Sea of Clouds and the Sea of Humours with a luminousnetwork. What was the origin of these sparkling rays, which shone on theplains as well as on the reliefs, at whatever height they might be? Allstarted from a common centre, the crater of Tycho. They sprang from him.Herschel attributed their brilliancy to currents of lava congealed by thecold; an opinion, however, which has not been generally adopted. Otherastronomers have seen in these inexplicable rays a kind of _moraines_,rows of erratic blocks, which had been thrown up at the period of Tycho'sformation.
"And why not?" asked Nicholl of Barbicane, who was relating and rejectingthese different opinions.
"Because the regularity of these luminous lines, and the violencenecessary to carry volcanic matter to such distances, is inexplicable."
"Eh! by Jove!" replied Michel Ardan, "it seems easy enough to me toexplain the origin of these rays."
"Indeed?" said Barbicane.
"Indeed," continued Michel. "It is enough to say that it is a vast star,similar to that produced by a ball or a stone thrown at a square ofglass!"
"Well!" replied Barbicane, smiling. "And what hand would be powerfulenough to throw a ball to give such a shock as that?"
"The hand is not necessary," answered Nicholl, not at all confounded;"and as to the stone, let us suppose it to be a comet."
"Ah! those much-abused comets!" exclaimed Barbicane. "My brave Michel,your explanation is not bad; but your comet is useless. The shock whichproduced that rent must have come from the inside of the star. A violentcontraction of the lunar crust, while cooling, might suffice to imprintthis gigantic star."
"A contraction! something like a lunar stomach-ache," said Michel Ardan.
"Besides," added Barbicane, "this opinion is that of an English savant,Nasmyth, and it seems to me to sufficiently explain the radiation ofthese mountains."
"That Nasmyth was no fool!" replied Michel.
Long did the travellers, whom such a sight could never weary, admirethe splendours of Tycho. Their projectile, saturated with luminousgleams in the double irradiation of sun and moon, must have appearedlike an incandescent globe. They had passed suddenly from excessive coldto intense heat. Nature was thus preparing them to become Selenites.Become Selenites! That idea brought up once more the question of thehabitability of the moon. After what they had seen, could the travellerssolve it? Would they decide for or against it? Michel Ardan persuaded histwo friends to form an opinion, and asked them directly if they thoughtthat men and animals were represented in the lunar world.
Illustration: A VIOLENT CONTRACTION OF THE LUNAR CRUST.
"I think that we can answer," said Barbicane; "but according to myidea the question ought not to be put in that form. I ask it to be putdifferently."
"Put it your own way," replied Michel.
"Here it is," continued Barbicane. "The problem is a double one, andrequires a double solution. Is the moon _habitable?_ Has the moon everbeen _inhabitable?_"
"Good!" replied Nicholl. "First let us see whether the moon is habitable."
"To tell the truth, I know nothing about it," answered Michel.
"And I answer in the negative," continued Barbicane. "In her actualstate, with her surrounding atmosphere certainly very much reduced,her seas for the most part dried up, her insufficient supply of waterrestricted, vegetation, sudden alterations of cold and heat, her daysand nights of 354 hours; the moon does not seem habitable to me, nor doesshe seem propitious to animal development, nor sufficient for the wantsof existence as we understand it."
"Agreed," replied Nicholl. "But is not the moon habitable for creaturesdifferently organized from ourselves?"
"That question is more difficult to answer, but I will try; and I askNicholl if _motion_ appears to him to be a necessary result of _life_,whatever be its organization?"
"Without a doubt!" answered Nicholl.
"Then, my worthy companion, I would answer that we have observed thelunar continent at a distance of 500 yards at most, and that nothingseemed to us to move on the moon's surface. The presence of any kindof life would have been betrayed by its attendant marks, such as diversbuildings, and even by ruins. And what have we seen? Everywhere and alwaysthe geological works of nature, never the work of man. If, then, thereexist representatives of the animal kingdom on the moon, they must havefled to those unfathomable cavities which the eye cannot reach; whichI cannot admit, for they must have left traces of their passage on thoseplains which the atmosphere must cover, however slightly raised it may be.These traces are nowhere visible. There remains but one hypothesis, thatof a living race to which motion, which is life, is foreign."
"One might as well say, living creatures which do not live," repliedMichel.
"Just so," said Barbicane, "which for us has no meaning."
"Then we may form our opinion?" said Michel.
"Yes," replied Nicholl.
"Very well," continued Michel Ardan, "the Scientific Commission assembledin the projectile of the Gun Club, after having founded their argumenton facts recently observed, decide unanimously upon the question of thehabitability of the moon--_'No!_ the moon is not habitable.'"
This decision was consigned by President Barbicane to his notebook, wherethe process of the sitting of the 6th of December may be seen.
"Now," said Nicholl, "let us attack the second question, an indispensablecomplement of the first. I ask the honourable Commission, if the moon isnot habitable, has she ever been inhabited, Citizen Barbicane?"
"My friends," replied Barbicane, "I did not undertake this journey inorder to form an opinion on the past habitability of our satellite; but Iwill add that our personal observations only confirm me in this opinion.I believe, indeed I affirm, that the moon has been inhabited by a humanrace organized like our own; that she has produced animals anatomicallyformed like the terrestrial animals; but I add that these races, humanor animal, have had their day, and are now for ever extinct!"
"Then," asked Michel, "the moon must be older than the earth?"
"No!" said Barbicane decidedly, "but a world which has grown old quicker,and whose formation and deformation have been more rapid. Relatively,the organizing force of matter has been much more violent in the interiorof the moon than in the interior of the terrestrial globe. The actualstate of this cracked twisted, and burst disc abundantly proves this.The moon and the earth were nothing but gaseous masses originally. Thesegases have passed into a liquid state under different influences, andthe solid masses have been formed later. But most certainly our spherewas still gaseous or liquid, when the moon was solidified by cooling,and had become habitable."
"I believe it," said Nicholl.
"Then," continued Barbicane, "an atmosphere surrounded it, the waterscontained within this gaseous envelope could not evaporate. Under theinfluence of air, water, light, solar heat, and central heat, vegetationtook possession of the continents prepared to receive it, and certainlylife showed itself about this period, for nature does not expend herselfin vain; and a world so wonderfully formed for habitation must necessarilybe inhabited.
"But," said Ni
choll, "many phenomena inherent in our satellite mightcramp the expansion of the animal and vegetable kingdom. For example,its days and nights of 354 hours?"
"At the terrestrial poles they last six months," said Michel.
"An argument of little value, since the poles are not inhabited."
"Let us observe, my friends," continued Barbicane, "that if in the actualstate of the moon its long nights and long days created differencesof temperature insupportable to organization, it was not so at thehistorical period of time. The atmosphere enveloped the disc with afluid mantle; vapour deposited itself in the shape of clouds; thisnatural screen tempered the ardour of the solar rays, and retained thenocturnal radiation. Light, like heat, can diffuse itself in the air;hence an equality between the influences which no longer exists, now thatthat atmosphere has almost entirely disappeared. And now I am going toastonish you."
"Astonish us?" said Michel Ardan.
"I firmly believe that at the period when the moon was inhabited, thenights and days did not last 354 hours!"
"And why?" asked Nicholl quickly.
"Because most probably then the rotary motion of the moon upon her axiswas not equal to her revolution, an equality which presents each part ofher disc during fifteen days to the action of the solar rays."
"Granted," replied Nicholl, "but why should not these two motions havebeen equal, as they are really so?"
"Because that equality has only been determined by terrestrial attraction.And who can say that this attraction was powerful enough to alter themotion of the moon at that period when the earth was still fluid?"
"Just so," replied Nicholl; "and who can say that the moon has alwaysbeen a satellite of the earth?"
"And who can say," exclaimed Michel Ardan, "that the moon did not existbefore the earth?"
Their imaginations carried them away into an indefinite field ofhypothesis. Barbicane sought to restrain them.
"Those speculations are too high," said he; "problems utterly insoluble.Do not let us enter upon them. Let us only admit the insufficiency of theprimordial attraction; and then by the inequality of the two motions ofrotation and revolution, the days and nights could have succeeded eachother on the moon as they succeed each other on the earth. Besides, evenwithout these conditions, life was possible."
"And so," asked Michel Ardan, "humanity has disappeared from the moon?"
"Yes," replied Barbicane, "after having doubtless remained persistentlyfor millions of centuries; by degrees the atmosphere becoming rarefied,the disc became uninhabitable, as the terrestrial globe will one daybecome by cooling."
"By cooling?"
"Certainly," replied Barbicane; "as the internal fires became extinguished,and the incandescent matter concentrated itself, the lunar crust cooled.By degrees the consequences of these phenomena showed themselves in thedisappearance of organized beings, and by the disappearance of vegetation.Soon the atmosphere was rarefied, probably withdrawn by terrestrialattraction; then aerial departure of respirable air, and disappearanceof water by means of evaporation. At this period the moon becominguninhabitable, was no longer inhabited. It was a dead world, such as wesee it to-day."
"And you say that the same fate is in store for the earth?"
"Most probably."
"But when?"
"When the cooling of its crust shall have made it uninhabitable."
"And have they calculated the time which our unfortunate sphere will taketo cool?"
"Certainly."
"And you know these calculations?"
"Perfectly."
"But speak, then, my clumsy savant," exclaimed Michel Ardan, "for youmake me boil with impatience!"
"Very well, my good Michel," replied Barbicane quietly, "we know whatdiminution of temperature the earth undergoes in the lapse of a century.And according to certain calculations, this mean temperature will, aftera period of 400,000 years, be brought down to zero!"
"Four hundred thousand years!" exclaimed Michel. "Ah! I breathe again.Really I was frightened to hear you; I imagined that we had not more than50,000 years to live."
Barbicane and Nicholl could not help laughing at their companion'suneasiness. Then Nicholl, who wished to end the discussion, put thesecond question, which had just been considered again.
"Has the moon been inhabited?" he asked.
The answer was unanimously in the affirmative. But during this discussion,fruitful in somewhat hazardous theories, the projectile was rapidlyleaving the moon; the lineaments faded away from the travellers' eyes,mountains were confused in the distance; and of all the wonderful,strange, and fantastical form of the earth's satellite, there soonremained nothing but the imperishable remembrance.
