Jules Verne - All Around the Moon

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"I must agree with you of course, Mr. Midshipman," replied Brownson
with a slight smile; "I have no grounds whatever for contradicting you."

"Neither have I," observed another officer, the surgeon of the vessel.
"The Projectile was to have reached the Moon when at her full, which was
at midnight on the 5th. To-day was the 11th. This gives them six days of
clear light--time enough in all conscience not only to land safely but
to install themselves quite comfortably in their new home. In fact, I
see them there already--"

"In my mind's eye, Horatio!" laughed one of the group. "Though the Doc
wears glasses, he can see more than any ten men on board."

--"Already"--pursued the Doctor, heedless of the interruption. "_Scene_,
a stony valley near a Selenite stream; the Projectile on the right, half
buried in volcanic _scoriae_, but apparently not much the worse for the
wear; ring mountains, craters, sharp peaks, etc. all around; old MAC
discovered taking observations with his levelling staff; BARBICAN
perched on the summit of a sharp pointed rock, writing up his note-book;
ARDAN, eye-glass on nose, hat under arm, legs apart, puffing at his
_Imperador_, like a--"

[Illustration: MAC DISCOVERED TAKING OBSERVATIONS.]

--"A locomotive!" interrupted the young Midshipman, his excitable
imagination so far getting the better of him as to make him forget his
manners. He had just finished Locke's famous MOON HOAX, and his brain
was still full of its pictures. "In the background," he went on, "can be
seen thousands of _Vespertiliones-Homines_ or _Man-Bats_, in all the
various attitudes of curiosity, alarm, or consternation; some of them
peeping around the rocks, some fluttering from peak to peak, all
gibbering a language more or less resembling the notes of birds. _Enter_
LUNATICO, King of the Selenites--"

"Excuse us, Mr. Midshipman," interrupted Brownson with an easy smile,
"Locke's authority may have great weight among the young Middies at
Annapolis, but it does not rank very high at present in the estimation
of practical scientists." This rebuff administered to the conceited
little Midshipman, a rebuff which the Doctor particularly relished,
Brownson continued: "Gentlemen, we certainly know nothing whatever
regarding our friends' fate; guessing gives no information. How we ever
are to hear from the Moon until we are connected with it by a lunar
cable, I can't even imagine. The probability is that we shall never--"

"Excuse me, Lieutenant," interrupted the unrebuffed little Midshipman;
"Can't Barbican write?"

A shout of derisive comments greeted this question.

"Certainly he can write, and send his letter by the Pony Express!" cried
one.

"A Postal Card would be cheaper!" cried another.

"The _New York Herald_ will send a reporter after it!" was the
exclamation of a third.

"Keep cool, just keep cool, gentlemen," persisted the little Midshipman,
not in the least abashed by the uproarious hilarity excited by his
remarks. "I asked if Barbican couldn't write. In that question I see
nothing whatever to laugh at. Can't a man write without being obliged to
send his letters?"

"This is all nonsense," said the Doctor. "What's the use of a man
writing to you if he can't send you what he writes?"

"What's the use of his sending it to you if he can have it read without
that trouble?" answered the little Midshipman in a confident tone. "Is
there not a telescope at Long's Peak? Doesn't it bring the Moon within a
few miles of the Rocky Mountains, and enable us to see on her surface,
objects as small as nine feet in diameter? Well! What's to prevent
Barbican and his friends from constructing a gigantic alphabet? If they
write words of even a few hundred yards and sentences a mile or two
long, what is to prevent us from reading them? Catch the idea now, eh?"

They did catch the idea, and heartily applauded the little Middy for his
smartness. Even the Doctor saw a certain kind of merit in it, and
Brownson acknowledged it to be quite feasible. In fact, expanding on it,
the Lieutenant assured his hearers that, by means of large parabolic
reflectors, luminous groups of rays could be dispatched from the Earth,
of sufficient brightness to establish direct communication even with
Venus or Mars, where these rays would be quite as visible as the planet
Neptune is from the Earth. He even added that those brilliant points of
light, which have been quite frequently observed in Mars and Venus, are
perhaps signals made to the Earth by the inhabitants of these planets.
He concluded, however, by observing that, though we might by these means
succeed in obtaining news from the Moon, we could not possibly send any
intelligence back in return, unless indeed the Selenites had at their
disposal optical instruments at least as good as ours.

All agreed that this was very true, and, as is generally the case when
one keeps all the talk to himself, the conversation now assumed so
serious a turn that for some time it was hardly worth recording.

At last the Chief Engineer, excited by some remark that had been made,
observed with much earnestness:

"You may say what you please, gentlemen, but I would willingly give my
last dollar to know what has become of those brave men! Have they done
anything? Have they seen anything? I hope they have. But I should dearly
like to know. Ever so little success would warrant a repetition of the
great experiment. The Columbiad is still to the good in Florida, as it
will be for many a long day. There are millions of men to day as curious
as I am upon the subject. Therefore it will be only a question of mere
powder and bullets if a cargo of visitors is not sent to the Moon every
time she passes our zenith.

"Marston would be one of the first of them," observed Brownson, lighting
his cigar.

"Oh, he would have plenty of company!" cried the Midshipman. "I should
be delighted to go if he'd only take me."

"No doubt you would, Mr. Midshipman," said Brownson, "the wise men, you
know, are not all dead yet."

"Nor the fools either, Lieutenant," growled old Frisby, the fourth
officer, getting tired of the conversation.

"There is no question at all about it," observed another; "every time a
Projectile started, it would take off as many as it could carry."

"I wish it would only start often enough to improve the breed!" growled
old Frisby.

"I have no doubt whatever," added the Chief Engineer, "that the thing
would get so fashionable at last that half the inhabitants of the Earth
would take a trip to the Moon."

"I should limit that privilege strictly to some of our friends in
Washington," said old Frisby, whose temper had been soured probably by a
neglect to recognize his long services; "and most of them I should by
all means insist on sending to the Moon. Every month I would ram a whole
raft of them into the Columbiad, with a charge under them strong enough
to blow them all to the--But--Hey!--what in creation's that?"

[Illustration: FOR A SECOND ONLY DID THEY CATCH ITS FLASH.]

Whilst the officer was speaking, his companions had suddenly caught a
sound in the air which reminded them immediately of the whistling scream
of a Lancaster shell. At first they thought the steam was escaping
somewhere, but, looking upwards, they saw that the strange noise
proceeded from a ball of dazzling brightness, directly over their heads,
and evidently falling towards them with tremendous velocity. Too
frightened to say a word, they could only see that in its light the
whole ship blazed like fireworks, and the whole sea glittered like a
silver lake. Quicker than tongue can utter, or mind can conceive, it
flashed before their eyes for a second, an enormous bolide set on fire
by friction with the atmosphere, and gleaming in its white heat like a
stream of molten iron gushing straight from the furnace. For a second
only did they catch its flash before their eyes; then striking the
bowsprit of the vessel, which it shivered into a thousand pieces, it
vanished in the sea in an instant with a hiss, a scream, and a roar, all
equally indescribable. For some time the utmost confusion reigned on
deck. With eyes too dazzled to see, ears still ringing with the
frightful combination of unearthly sounds, faces splashed with floods of
sea water, and noses stifled with clouds of scalding steam, the crew of
the _Susquehanna_ could hardly realize that their marvellous escape by a
few feet from instant and certain destruction was an accomplished fact,
not a frightful dream. They were still engaged in trying to open their
eyes and to get the hot water out of their ears, when they suddenly
heard the trumpet voice of Captain Bloomsbury crying, as he stood half
dressed on the head of the cabin stairs:

"What's up, gentlemen? In heaven's name, what's up?"

The little Midshipman had been knocked flat by the concussion and
stunned by the uproar. But before any body else could reply, his voice
was heard, clear and sharp, piercing the din like an arrow:

"It's THEY, Captain! Didn't I tell you so?"

CHAPTER XXI.

NEWS FOR MARSTON!

In a few minutes, consciousness had restored order on board the
_Susquehanna_, but the excitement was as great as ever. They had escaped
by a hairsbreadth the terrible fate of being both burned and drowned
without a moment's warning, without a single soul being left alive to
tell the fatal tale; but on this neither officer nor man appeared to
bestow the slightest thought. They were wholly engrossed with the
terrible catastrophe that had befallen the famous adventurers. What was
the loss of the _Susquehanna_ and all it contained, in comparison to the
loss experienced by the world at large in the terrible tragic
_denouement_ just witnessed? The worst had now come to the worst. At
last the long agony was over forever. Those three gallant men, who had
not only conceived but had actually executed the grandest and most
daring enterprise of ancient or modern times, had paid by the most
fearful of deaths, for their sublime devotion to science and their
unselfish desire to extend the bounds of human knowledge! Before such a
reflection as this, all other considerations were at once reduced to
proportions of the most absolute insignificance.

But was the death of the adventurers so very certain after all? Hope is
hard to kill. Consciousness had brought reflection, reflection doubt,
and doubt had resuscitated hope.

"It's they!" had exclaimed the little Midshipman, and the cry had
thrilled every heart on board as with an electric shock. Everybody had
instantly understood it. Everybody had felt it to be true. Nothing could
be more certain than that the meteor which had just flashed before their
eyes was the famous projectile of the Baltimore Gun Club. Nothing could
be truer than that it contained the three world renowned men and that it
now lay in the black depths of the Pacific Ocean.

But here opinions began to diverge. Some courageous breasts soon refused
to accept the prevalent idea.

"They're killed by the shock!" cried the crowd.

"Killed?" exclaimed the hopeful ones; "Not a bit of it! The water here
is deep enough to break a fall twice as great."

"They're smothered for want of air!" exclaimed the crowd.

"Their stock may not be run out yet!" was the ready reply. "Their air
apparatus is still on hand."

"They're burned to a cinder!" shrieked the crowd.

"They had not time to be burned!" answered the Band of Hope. "The
Projectile did not get hot till it reached the atmosphere, through which
it tore in a few seconds."

"If they're neither burned nor smothered nor killed by the shock,
they're sure to be drowned!" persisted the crowd, with redoubled
lamentations.

"Fish 'em up first!" cried the Hopeful Band. "Come! Let's lose no time!
Let's fish 'em up at once!"

The cries of Hope prevailed. The unanimous opinion of a council of the
officers hastily summoned together by the Captain was to go to work and
fish up the Projectile with the least possible delay. But was such an
operation possible? asked a doubter. Yes! was the overwhelming reply;
difficult, no doubt, but still quite possible. Certainly, however, such
an attempt was not immediately possible as the _Susquehanna_ had no
machinery strong enough or suitable enough for a piece of work involving
such a nicety of detailed operations, not to speak of its exceeding
difficulty. The next unanimous decision, therefore, was to start the
vessel at once for the nearest port, whence they could instantly
telegraph the Projectile's arrival to the Baltimore Gun Club.

But what _was_ the nearest port? A serious question, to answer which in
a satisfactory manner the Captain had to carefully examine his sailing
charts. The neighboring shores of the California Peninsula, low and
sandy, were absolutely destitute of good harbors. San Diego, about a
day's sail directly north, possessed an excellent harbor, but, not yet
having telegraphic communication with the rest of the Union, it was of
course not to be thought of. San Pedro Bay was too open to be approached
in winter. The Santa Barbara Channel was liable to the same objection,
not to mention the trouble often caused by kelp and wintry fogs. The bay
of San Luis Obispo was still worse in every respect; having no islands
to act as a breakwater, landing there in winter was often impossible.
The harbor of the picturesque old town of Monterey was safe enough, but
some uncertainty regarding sure telegraphic communications with San
Francisco, decided the council not to venture it. Half Moon Bay, a
little to the north, would be just as risky, and in moments like the
present when every minute was worth a day, no risk involving the
slightest loss of time could be ventured.

Evidently, therefore, the most advisable plan was to sail directly for
the bay of San Francisco, the Golden Gate, the finest harbor on the
Pacific Coast and one of the safest in the world. Here telegraphic
communication with all parts of the Union was assured beyond a doubt.
San Francisco, about 750 miles distant, the _Susquehanna_ could probably
make in three days; with a little increased pressure, possibly in two
days and a-half. The sooner then she started, the better.

The fires were soon in full blast. The vessel could get under weigh at
once. In fact, nothing delayed immediate departure but the consideration
that two miles of sounding line were still to be hauled up from the
ocean depths. Rut the Captain, after a moment's thought, unwilling that
any more time should be lost, determined to cut it. Then marking its
position by fastening its end to a buoy, he could haul it up at his
leisure on his return.

"Besides," said he, "the buoy will show us the precise spot where the
Projectile fell."

"As for that, Captain," observed Brownson, "the exact spot has been
carefully recorded already: 27 deg. 7' north latitude by 41 deg. 37' west
longitude, reckoning from the meridian of Washington."

"All right, Lieutenant," said the Captain curtly. "Cut the line!"

A large cone-shaped metal buoy, strengthened still further by a couple
of stout spars to which it was securely lashed, was soon rigged up on
deck, whence, being hoisted overboard, the whole apparatus was carefully
lowered to the surface of the sea. By means of a ring in the small end
of the buoy, the latter was then solidly attached to the part of the
sounding line that still remained in the water, and all possible
precautions were taken to diminish the danger of friction, caused by the
contrary currents, tidal waves, and the ordinary heaving swells of
ocean.

It was now a little after three o'clock in the morning. The Chief
Engineer announced everything to be in perfect readiness for starting.
The Captain gave the signal, directing the pilot to steer straight for
San Francisco, north-north by west. The waters under the stern began to
boil and foam; the ship very soon felt and yielded to the power that
animated her; and in a few minutes she was making at least twelve knots
an hour. Her sailing powers were somewhat higher than this, but it was
necessary to be careful in the neighborhood of such a dangerous coast as
that of California.

Seven hundred and fifty miles of smooth waters presented no very
difficult task to a fast traveller like the _Susquehanna_, yet it was
not till two days and a-half afterwards that she sighted the Golden
Gate. As usual, the coast was foggy; neither Point Lobos nor Point
Boneta could be seen. But Captain Bloomsbury, well acquainted with every
portion of this coast, ran as close along the southern shore as he
dared, the fog-gun at Point Boneta safely directing his course. Here
expecting to be able to gain a few hours time by signalling to the outer
telegraph station on Point Lobos, he had caused to be painted on a sail
in large black letters: "THE MOONMEN ARE BACK!" but the officers in
attendance, though their fog-horn could be easily heard--the distance
not being quite two miles--were unfortunately not able to see it.
Perhaps they did see it, but feared a hoax.

Giving the Fort Point a good wide berth, the _Susquehanna_ found the fog
gradually clearing away, and by half-past three the passengers, looking
under it, enjoyed the glorious view of the Contra Costa mountains east
of San Francisco, which had obtained for this entrance the famous and
well deserved appellation of the Golden Gate. In another half hour, they
had doubled Black Point, and were lying safely at anchor between the
islands of Alcatraz and Yerba Buena. In less than five minutes
afterwards the Captain was quickly lowered into his gig, and eight stout
pairs of arms were pulling him rapidly to shore.

The usual crowd of idlers had collected that evening on the summit of
Telegraph Hill to enjoy the magnificent view, which for variety, extent,
beauty and grandeur, is probably unsurpassed on earth. Of course, the
inevitable reporter, hot after an item, was not absent. The
_Susquehanna_ had hardly crossed the bar, when they caught sight of her.
A government vessel entering the bay at full speed, is something to look
at even in San Francisco. Even during the war, it would be considered
rather unusual. But they soon remarked that her bowsprit was completely
broken off. _Very_ unusual. Something decidedly is the matter. See! The
vessel is hardly anchored when the Captain leaves her and makes for
Megg's Wharf at North Point as hard as ever his men can pull! Something
_must_ be the matter--and down the steep hill they all rush as fast as
ever their legs can carry them to the landing at Megg's Wharf.

The Captain could hardly force his way through the dense throng, but he
made no attempt whatever to gratify their ill dissembled curiosity.

"Carriage!" he cried, in a voice seldom heard outside the din of battle.

In a moment seventeen able-bodied cabmen were trying to tear him limb
from limb.

"To the telegraph office! Like lightning!" were his stifled mutterings,
as he struggled in the arms of the Irish giant who had at last
succeeded in securing him.

"To the telegraph office!" cried most of the crowd, running after him
like fox hounds, but the more knowing ones immediately began questioning
the boatmen in the Captain's gig. These honest fellows, nothing loth to
tell all that they knew and more that they invented, soon had the
satisfaction of finding themselves the centrepoint of a wonder stricken
audience, greedily swallowing up every item of the extraordinary news
and still hungrily gaping for more.

By this time, however, an important dispatch was flying east, bearing
four different addresses: To the Secretary of the U.S. Navy, Washington;
To Colonel Joseph Wilcox, Vice-President _pro tem._, Baltimore Gun Club,
Md; To J.T. Marston, Esq. Long's Peak, Grand County, Colorado; and To
Professor Wenlock, Sub-Director of the Cambridge Observatory, Mass.

This dispatch read as follows:

"In latitude twenty-seven degrees seven minutes north and longitude
forty-one degrees thirty-seven minutes west shortly after one
o'clock on the morning of twelfth instant Columbiad Projectile fell
in Pacific--send instructions--

BLOOMSBURY,

_Captain_, SUSQUEHANNA."

In five minutes more all San Francisco had the news. An hour later, the
newspaper boys were shrieking it through the great cities of the
States. Before bed-time every man, woman, and child in the country had
heard it and gone into ecstasies over it. Owing to the difference in
longitude, the people of Europe could not hear it till after midnight.
But next morning the astounding issue of the great American enterprise
fell on them like a thunder clap.

We must, of course, decline all attempts at describing the effects of
this most unexpected intelligence on the world at large.

The Secretary of the Navy immediately telegraphed directions to the
_Susquehanna_ to keep a full head of steam up night and day so as to be
ready to give instant execution to orders received at any moment.

The Observatory authorities at Cambridge held a special meeting that
very evening, where, with all the serene calmness so characteristic of
learned societies, they discussed the scientific points of the question
in all its bearings. But, before committing themselves to any decided
opinion, they unanimously resolved to wait for the development of
further details.

At the rooms of the Gun Club in Baltimore there was a terrible time. The
kind reader no doubt remembers the nature of the dispatch sent one day
previously by Professor Belfast from the Long's Peak observatory,
announcing that the Projectile had been seen but that it had become the
Moon's satellite, destined to revolve around her forever and ever till
time should be no more. The reader is also kindly aware by this time
that such dispatch was not supported by the slightest foundations in
fact. The learned Professor, in a moment of temporary cerebral
excitation, to which even the greatest scientist is just as liable as
the rest of us, had taken some little meteor or, still more probably,
some little fly-speck in the telescope for the Projectile. The worst of
it was that he had not only boldly proclaimed his alleged discovery to
the world at large but he had even explained all about it with the well
known easy pomposity that "Science" sometimes ventures to assume. The
consequences of all this may be readily guessed. The Baltimore Gun Club
had split up immediately into two violently opposed parties. Those
gentlemen who regularly conned the scientific magazines, took every word
of the learned Professor's dispatch for gospel--or rather for something
of far higher value, and more strictly in accordance with the highly
advanced scientific developments of the day. But the others, who never
read anything but the daily papers and who could not bear the idea of
losing Barbican, laughed the whole thing to scorn. Belfast, they said,
had seen as much of the Projectile as he had of the "Open Polar Sea,"
and the rest of the dispatch was mere twaddle, though asserted with all
the sternness of a religious dogma and enveloped in the usual scientific
slang.

The meeting held in the Club House, 24 Monument Square, Baltimore, on
the evening of the 13th, had been therefore disorderly in the highest
degree. Long before the appointed hour, the great hall was densely
packed and the greatest uproar prevailed. Vice-President Wilcox took the
chair, and all was comparatively quiet until Colonel Bloomsbury, the
Honorary Secretary in Marston's absence, commenced to read Belfast's
dispatch. Then the scene, according to the account given in the next
day's _Sun_, from whose columns we condense our report, actually
"beggared description." Roars, yells, cheers, counter-cheers, clappings,
hissings, stampings, squallings, whistlings, barkings, mewings, cock
crowings, all of the most fearful and demoniacal character, turned the
immense hall into a regular pandemonium. In vain did President Wilcox
fire off his detonating bell, with a report on ordinary occasions as
loud as the roar of a small piece of ordnance. In the dreadful noise
then prevailing it was no more heard than the fizz of a lucifer match.

Some cries, however, made themselves occasionally heard in the pauses of
the din. "Read! Read!" "Dry up!" "Sit down!" "Give him an egg!" "Fair
play!" "Hurrah for Barbican!" "Down with his enemies!" "Free Speech!"
"Belfast won't bite you!" "He'd like to bite Barbican, but his teeth
aren't sharp enough!" "Barbican's a martyr to science, let's hear his
fate!" "Martyr be hanged; the Old Man is to the good yet!" "Belfast is
the grandest name in Science!" "Groans for the grandest name!" (Awful
groans.) "Three cheers for Old Man Barbican!" (The exceptional strength
alone of the walls saved the building, from being blown out by an
explosion in which at least 5,000 pairs of lungs participated.)

"Three cheers for M'Nicholl and the Frenchman!" This was followed by
another burst of cheering so hearty, vigorous and long continued that
the scientific party, or _Belfasters_ as they were now called, seeing
that further prolongation of the meet was perfectly useless, moved to
adjourn. It was carried unanimously. President Wilcox left the chair,
the meeting broke up in the wildest disorder--the scientists rather
crest fallen, but the Barbican men quite jubilant for having been so
successful in preventing the reading of that detested dispatch.

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