United States or Kiribati ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
You have given me all the information I required;" and, with a low bow and a gracious smile, the captain withdrew. The orderly made an equally polite bow, and followed his master. The professor, completely nonplussed, was left alone. Thirteen days, then twenty-six of the original Gallian days, fifty-two of the present was all the time for preparation that now remained.
"Europe, indeed!" muttered the Jew maliciously between his teeth. "European prices will not do for me. I must have Gallian prices and of my own fixing, too!" So large a portion of the vessel had been appropriated to the cargo that the space reserved for the cabin was of most meager dimensions.
Nina balanced the piece of ice two or three times in her hand, and threw it forward with all her strength. A sudden thrill seemed to vibrate across the motionless waters to the distant horizon, and the Gallian Sea had become a solid sheet of ice!
"Not at all! not at all! I do not intend to use any other," was the professor's bluff reply. After pondering for a few moments, the captain spoke again. "According, then, to this new calendar, it isn't the middle of May at all; it must now be some time in March." "Yes," said the professor, "to-day is the 26th of March. It is the 266th day of the Gallian year.
During the first half of the Gallian year, Lieutenant Procope had taken careful note of Rosette's monthly announcements of the comet's progress, and he was able now, without reference to the professor, to calculate the rate of advance on its way back towards the sun.
The torrent of lava fell into a small rock-bound basin that had no apparent communication with the sea, and was evidently the aperture of a deep abyss, of which the waters, heated by the descent of the eruptive matter, would no doubt retain their liquid condition long after the Gallian Sea had become a sheet of ice.
"No doubt," said Ben Zoof, "this time we shall stick together." Another thought occurred. Was it not only too likely that, in the fusion of the two atmospheres, the balloon itself, in which they were being conveyed, would be rent into ribbons, and every one of its passengers hurled into destruction, so that not a Gallian should survive to tell the tale of their strange peregrinations?
Little streams of water began to trickle down the declivities of the mountain and along the shelving shore, only to be transformed, as the melting of the snow continued, into torrents or cascades. Light vapors gathered on the horizon, and clouds were formed and carried rapidly along by breezes to which the Gallian atmosphere had long been unaccustomed.
Without noticing the interruption, Servadac continued his own remarks, "The comet then, I see, is to reach its aphelion on the 15th of January, exactly a twelvemonth after passing its perihelion." "A twelvemonth! Not a Gallian twelvemonth?" exclaimed Rosette. Servadac looked bewildered. Lieutenant Procope could not suppress a smile.
Nay, was it not to be expected that he had already estimated, with sufficient approximation to truth, what was to be the true length of the Gallian year? So intently had they each separately been following their own train of thought, that daylight reappeared almost before the travelers were aware of it.
Word Of The Day