by Jules Verne
"That is enough," said Michel, getting animated. "Let us hear no more about returning. As to communicating with our ancient colleagues upon earth, that will not be difficult."
"How are we to do that, pray?"
"By means of meteors hurled by the lunar volcanoes."
"A good idea, Michel," answered Barbicane. "Laplace has calculated that a force five times superior to that of our cannons would suffice to send a meteor from the moon to the earth. Now there is no volcano that has not a superior force of propulsion."
"Hurrah!" cried Michel. "Meteors will be convenient postmen and will not cost anything! And how we shall laugh at the postal service! But now I think--"
"What do you think?"
"A superb idea! Why did we not fasten a telegraph wire to our bullet? We could have exchanged telegrams with the earth!"
"And the weight of a wire 86,000 leagues long," answered Nicholl, "does that go for nothing?"
"Yes, for nothing! We should have trebled the charge of the Columbiad! We could have made it four times--five times--greater!" cried Michel, whose voice became more and more violent.
"There is a slight objection to make to your project," answered Barbicane. "It is that during the movement of rotation of the globe our wire would have been rolled round it like a chain round a windlass, and it would inevitably have dragged us down to the earth again."
"By the thirty-nine stars of the Union!" said Michel, "I have nothing but impracticable ideas to-day--ideas worthy of J.T. Maston! But now I think of it, if we do not return to earth J.T. Maston will certainly come to us!"
"Yes! he will come," replied Barbicane; "he is a worthy and courageous comrade. Besides, what could be easier? Is not the Columbiad still lying in Floridian soil? Is cotton and nitric acid wanting wherewith to manufacture the projectile? Will not the moon again pass the zenith of Florida? In another eighteen years will she not occupy exactly the same place that she occupies to-day?"
"Yes," repeated Michel--"yes, Maston will come, and with him our friends Elphinstone, Blomsberry, and all the members of the Gun Club, and they will be welcome! Later on trains of projectiles will be established between the earth and the moon! Hurrah for J.T. Maston!"
It is probable that if the Honourable J.T. Maston did not hear the hurrahs uttered in his honour his ears tingled at least. What was he doing then? He was no doubt stationed in the Rocky Mountains at Long's Peak, trying to discover the invisible bullet gravitating in space. If he was thinking of his dear companions it must be acknowledged that they were not behindhand with him, and that, under the influence of singular exaltation, they consecrated their best thoughts to him.
But whence came the animation that grew visibly greater in the inhabitants of the projectile? Their sobriety could not be questioned. Must this strange erethismus of the brain be attributed to the exceptional circumstances of the time, to that proximity of the Queen of Night from which a few hours only separated them, or to some secret influence of the moon acting on their nervous system? Their faces became as red as if exposed to the reverberation of a furnace; their respiration became more active, and their lungs played like forge-bellows; their eyes shone with extraordinary flame, and their voices became formidably loud, their words escaped like a champagne-cork driven forth by carbonic acid gas; their gestures became disquieting, they wanted so much room to perform them in. And, strange to say, they in no wise perceived this excessive tension of the mind.
"Now," said Nicholl in a sharp tone--"now that I do not know whether we shall come back from the moon, I will know what we are going there for!"
"What we are going there for!" answered Barbicane, stamping as if he were in a fencing-room; "I don't know."
"You don't know!" cried Michel with a shout that provoked a sonorous echo in the projectile.
"No, I have not the least idea!" answered Barbicane, shouting in unison with his interlocutor.
"Well, then, I know," answered Michel.
"Speak, then," said Nicholl, who could no longer restrain the angry tones of his voice.
"I shall speak if it suits me!" cried Michel, violently seizing his companion's arm. "It must suit you!" said Barbicane, with eyes on fire and threatening hands. "It was you who drew us into this terrible journey, and we wish to know why!"
"Yes," said the captain, "now I don't know where I am going, I will know why I am going."
"Why?" cried Michel, jumping a yard high--"why? To take possession of the moon in the name of the United States! To add a fortieth State to the Union! To colonise the lunar regions, to cultivate them, people them, to take them all the wonders of art, science, and industry! To civilise the Selenites, unless they are more civilised than we are, and to make them into a republic if they have not already done it for themselves!"
"If there are any Selenites!" answered Nicholl, who under the empire of this inexplicable intoxication became very contradictory.
"Who says there are no Selenites?" cried Michel in a threatening tone.
"I do!" shouted Nicholl.
"Captain," said Michel, "do not repeat that insult or I will knock your teeth down your throat!"
The two adversaries were about to rush upon one another, and this incoherent discussion was threatening to degenerate into a battle, when Barbicane interfered.
"Stop, unhappy men," said he, putting his two companions back to back, "if there are no Selenites, we will do without them!"
"Yes!" exclaimed Michel, who did not care more about them than that. "We have nothing to do with the Selenites! Bother the Selenites!"
"The empire of the moon shall be ours," said Nicholl. "Let us found a Republic of three!"
"I shall be the Congress," cried Michel.
"And I the Senate," answered Nicholl.
"And Barbicane the President," shouted Michel.
"No President elected by the nation!" answered Barbicane.
"Well, then, a President elected by the Congress," exclaimed Michel; "and as I am the Congress I elect you unanimously."
"Hurrah! hurrah! hurrah for President Barbicane!" exclaimed Nicholl.
"Hip--hip--hip! hurrah!" vociferated Michel Ardan.
Then the President and Senate struck up "Yankee Doodle" as loudly as they could, whilst the Congress shouted the virile "Marseillaise."
Then began a frantic dance with maniacal gestures, mad stamping, and somersaults of boneless clowns. Diana took part in the dance, howling too, and jumped to the very roof of the projectile. An inexplicable flapping of wings and cock-crows of singular sonority were heard. Five or six fowls flew about striking the walls like mad bats.
Then the three travelling companions, whose lungs were disorganised under some incomprehensible influence, more than intoxicated, burnt by the air that had set their breathing apparatus on fire, fell motionless upon the bottom of the projectile.
CHAPTER VIII.
AT SEVENTY-EIGHT THOUSAND ONE HUNDRED AND FOURTEEN LEAGUES.
What had happened? What was the cause of that singular intoxication, the consequences of which might prove so disastrous? Simply carelessness on Michel's part, which Nicholl was able to remedy in time.
After a veritable swoon, which lasted a few minutes, the captain, who was the first to regain consciousness, soon collected his intellectual faculties.
Although he had breakfasted two hours before, he began to feel as hungry as if he had not tasted food for several days. His whole being, his brain and stomach, were excited to the highest point.
He rose, therefore, and demanded a supplementary collation from Michel, who was still unconscious, and did not answer. Nicholl, therefore, proceeded to prepare some cups of tea, in order to facilitate the absorption of a dozen sandwiches. He busied himself first with lighting a fire, and so struck a match.
What was his surprise to see the sulphur burn with extraordinary and almost unbearable brilliancy! From the jet of gas he lighted rose a flame equal to floods of electric light.
A revelation took place in Nicholl's mind. This inten
sity of light, the physiological disturbance in himself, the extra excitement of all his moral and sensitive faculties--he understood it all.
"The oxygen!" he exclaimed.
And leaning over the air-apparatus, he saw that the tap was giving out a flood of colourless, savourless, and odourless gas, eminently vital, but which in a pure state produces the gravest disorders in the constitution. Through carelessness Michel had left the tap full on. Nicholl made haste to turn off this flow of oxygen with which the atmosphere was saturated, and which would have caused the death of the travellers, not by suffocation, but by combustion.
An hour afterwards the air was relieved, and gave their normal play to the lungs. By degrees the three friends recovered from their intoxication; but they were obliged to recover from their oxygen like a drunkard from his wine.
When Michel knew his share of responsibility in this incident he did not appear in the least disconcerted. This unexpected intoxication broke the monotony of the journey. Many foolish things had been said under its influence, but they had been forgotten as soon as said.
"Then," added the merry Frenchman, "I am not sorry for having experienced the effect of this captious gas. Do you know, my friends, that there might be a curious establishment set up with oxygen-rooms, where people whose constitutions are weak might live a more active life during a few hours at least? Suppose we had meetings where the air could be saturated with this heroic fluid, theatres where the managers would send it out in strong doses, what passion there would be in the souls of actors and spectators, what fire and what enthusiasm! And if, instead of a simple assembly, a whole nation could be saturated with it, what activity, what a supplement of life it would receive! Of an exhausted nation it perhaps would make a great and strong nation, and I know more than one state in old Europe that ought to put itself under the oxygen _régime_ in the interest of its health."
Michel spoke with as much animation as if the tap were still full on. But with one sentence Barbicane damped his enthusiasm.
"All that is very well, friend Michel," he said, "but now perhaps you will tell us where those fowls that joined in our concert came from."
"Those fowls?"
"Yes."
In fact, half-a-dozen hens and a superb cock were flying hither and thither.
"Ah, the stupids!" cried Michel. "It was the oxygen that put them in revolt."
"But what are you going to do with those fowls?" asked Barbicane.
"Acclimatise them in the moon of course! For the sake of a joke, my worthy president; simply a joke that has unhappily come to nothing! I wanted to let them out on the lunar continent without telling you! How astounded you would have been to see these terrestrial poultry pecking the fields of the moon!"
"Ah, _gamin_, you eternal boy!" answered Barbicane, "you don't want oxygen to make you out of your senses! You are always what we were under the influence of this gas! You are always insane!"
"Ah! how do we know we were not wiser then?" replied Michel Ardan.
After this philosophical reflection the three friends repaired the disorder in the projectile. Cock and hens were put back in their cage. But as they were doing this Barbicane and his two companions distinctly perceived a fresh phenomenon.
Since the moment they had left the earth their own weight, that of the bullet and the objects it contained, had suffered progressive diminution. Though they could not have any experience of this in the projectile, a moment must come when the effect upon themselves and the tools and instruments they used would be felt.
Of course scales would not have indicated this loss of weight, for the weights used would have lost precisely as much as the object itself; but a spring weighing-machine, the tension of which is independent of attraction, would have given the exact valuation of this diminution.
It is well known that attraction, or weight, is in proportion to the bulk, and in inverse proportion to the square of distances. Hence this consequence. If the earth had been alone in space, if the other heavenly bodies were to be suddenly annihilated, the projectile, according to Newton's law, would have weighed less according to its distance from the earth, but without ever losing its weight entirely, for the terrestrial attraction would always have made itself felt, no matter at what distance.
But in the case with which we are dealing, a moment must come when the projectile would not be at all under the law of gravitation, after allowing for the other celestial bodies, whose effect could not be set down as zero.
In fact, the trajectory of the projectile was between the earth and the moon. As it went farther away from the earth terrestrial attraction would be diminished in inverse proportion to the square of distances, but the lunar attraction would be augmented in the same proportion. A point must, therefore, be reached where these two attractions would neutralise each other, and the bullet would have no weight at all. If the volumes of the moon and earth were equal, this point would have been reached at an equal distance between the two bodies. But by taking their difference of bulk into account it was easy to calculate that this point would be situated at 47/52 of the journey, or at 78,114 leagues from the earth.
At this point a body that had no principle of velocity or movement in itself would remain eternally motionless, being equally attracted by the two heavenly bodies, and nothing drawing it more towards one than the other.
Now if the force of impulsion had been exactly calculated the projectile ought to reach that point with no velocity, having lost all weight like the objects it contained.
What would happen then? Three hypotheses presented themselves.
Either the projectile would have kept some velocity, and passing the point of equal attraction, would fall on the moon by virtue of the excess of lunar attraction over terrestrial attraction.
Or velocity sufficient to reach the neutral point being wanting, it would fall back on the earth by virtue of the excess of terrestrial attraction over lunar attraction.
Or lastly, endowed with sufficient velocity to reach the neutral point, but insufficient to pass it, it would remain eternally suspended in the same place, like the pretended coffin of Mahomet, between the zenith and nadir.
Such was the situation, and Barbicane clearly explained the consequences to his travelling companions. They were interested to the highest degree. How were they to know when they had reached this neutral point, situated at 78,114 leagues from the earth, at the precise moment when neither they nor the objects contained in the projectile should be in any way subject to the laws of weight?
Until now the travellers, though they had remarked that this action diminished little by little, had not yet perceived its total absence. But that day, about 11 a.m., Nicholl having let a tumbler escape from his hand, instead of falling, it remained suspended in the air.
"Ah!" cried Michel Ardan, "this is a little amusing chemistry!"
And immediately different objects, weapons, bottles, &c, left to themselves, hung suspended as if by miracle. Diana, too, lifted up by Michel into space, reproduced, but without trickery, the marvellous suspensions effected by Robert-Houdin and Maskelyne and Cook.
The three adventurous companions, surprised and stupefied in spite of their scientific reasoning, carried into the domain of the marvellous, felt weight go out of their bodies. When they stretched out their arms they felt no inclination to drop them. Their heads vacillated on their shoulders. Their feet no longer kept at the bottom of the projectile. They were like staggering drunkards. Imagination has created men deprived of their reflection, others deprived of their shadows! But here reality, by the neutrality of active forces, made men in whom nothing had any weight, and who weighed nothing themselves.
Suddenly Michel, making a slight spring, left the floor and remained suspended in the air like the good monk in Murillo's _Cuisine des Anges_. His two friends joined him in an instant, and all three, in the centre of the projectile, figured a miraculous ascension.
"Is it believable? Is it likely? Is it possible?" cried Michel. "No. And ye
t it exists! Ah! if Raphael could have seen us like this what an Assumption he could have put upon canvas!"
"The Assumption cannot last," answered Barbicane. "If the projectile passes the neutral point, the lunar attraction will draw us to the moon."
"Then our feet will rest upon the roof of the projectile,' answered Michel.
"No," said Barbicane, "because the centre of gravity in the projectile is very low, and it will turn over gradually."
"Then all our things will be turned upside down for certain!"
"Do not alarm yourself, Michel," answered Nicholl. "There is nothing of the kind to be feared. Not an object will move; the projectile will turn insensibly."
"In fact," resumed Barbicane, "when it has cleared the point of equal attraction, its bottom, relatively heavier, will drag it perpendicularly down to the moon. But in order that such a phenomenon should take place we must pass the neutral line."
"Passing the neutral line!" cried Michel. "Then let us do like the sailors who pass the equator--let us water our passage!"
A slight side movement took Michel to the padded wall. Thence he took a bottle and glasses, placed them "in space" before his companions, and merrily touching glasses, they saluted the line with a triple hurrah.
This influence of the attractions lasted scarcely an hour. The travellers saw themselves insensibly lowered towards the bottom, and Barbicane thought he remarked that the conical end of the projectile deviated slightly from the normal direction towards the moon. By an inverse movement the bottom side approached it. Lunar attraction was therefore gaining over terrestrial attraction. The fall towards the moon began, insensibly as yet; it could only be that of a millimetre (0.03937 inch), and a third in the first second. But the attractive force would gradually increase, the fall would be more accentuated, the projectile, dragged down by its bottom side, would present its cone to the earth, and would fall with increasing velocity until it reached the Selenite surface. Now nothing could prevent the success of the enterprise, and Nicholl and Michel Ardan shared Barbicane's joy.
