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A bullet is generally supposed to be a projectile capable of retaining its component parts in their integrity. The duty of the bullet is to preserve its direct course; it should possess a power of great penetration, should not be easily deflected, and together with penetrating power it should produce a stunning effect by an overpowering striking energy. How are we to combine these qualities?
It was like a moon, but a burning moon of almost unbearable brilliancy, outlined as it was on the total obscurity of space. This mass, of a circular form, threw such light that it filled the projectile. The faces of Barbicane, Nicholl, and Michel Ardan, bathed in its white waves, looked spectral, livid, blafard, like the appearance produced by the artificial light of alcohol impregnated with salt.
It was worded as follows: In 20@ 7' north latitude, and 41@ 37' west longitude, on the 12th of December, at seventeen minutes past one in the morning, the projectile of the Columbiad fell into the Pacific. Send instructions. BLOMSBERRY, Commander Susquehanna. Five minutes afterward the whole town of San Francisco learned the news.
It was, therefore, submitted in some proportion to its influence; but its own velocity also inclined it in an oblique line. Perhaps the result of these two influences would be a line that would become a tangent. But it was certain that the projectile was not falling normally upon the surface of the moon, for its base, by reason of its weight, ought to have been turned towards her.
"Maybe we'll land in the water," spoke Mark. "No, I can so regulate the projectile that such a thing won't happen," declared Mr. Roumann. "I will send it ahead for a few seconds, and then see what happens." They sped forward. Suddenly there loomed up before them a great mass. It seemed to be rushing to meet them. It looked something like the earth, as seen from a balloon at a great height.
"But I say," he continued, "what time is it?" "Three o'clock," answered Nicholl. "How the time goes," said Michel, "in the conversation of savants like us! Decidedly I feel myself getting too learned! I feel that I am becoming a well of knowledge!" So saying, Michel climbed to the roof of the projectile, "in order better to observe the moon," he pretended.
In these, wires are cut by the projectile at different points in its flight, and the breaking of the electric current causes the appearance of marks on a surface moving along at a known speed. The velocity of the projectile in going from one wire to another can then be found. Electricity is also used for firing great guns, both in ships and forts.
Were they three corpses? Had the Projectile suddenly become a great metallic coffin bearing its ghastly contents through the air with the rapidity of a lightning flash? In a very few minutes after the shock, one of the bodies stirred a little, the arms moved, the eyes opened, the head rose and tried to look around; finally, with some difficulty, the body managed to get on its knees.
The two professors were in the engine room. Washington White was in his galley, getting ready to serve the first meal in the air. Jack and Mark were in the pilot house, ready to do whatever was necessary and anxious to feel the thrill that would tell them the projectile had left the earth. "All ready?" asked Professor Henderson. "All ready," replied his German assistant.
"I wonder if we'll have pumpkin pie on the moon," thought Mark. "Though, of course, we won't. I guess all we'll have to eat will be what Washington takes along in the projectile that is, unless we find people on the other side of the place." He sat on the stone for some minutes longer, and then, tiring of the inactivity, he arose and strolled about.
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