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Rumor had it that arms and ammunition were running short in the Xedii armies. For two centuries, Xedii had depended on other planets to provide manufactured goods for her, and now those supplies were cut off, except for a miserably slow trickle that came in via the daring space officers who managed to evade the orbital forts that the Invaders had set up around the planet.
An ellipse is a circle bent a little, and the ellipse in which the earth actually moves comes from varying attraction and repulsion. Kepler's second law covers that. "If the orbital speed of the earth were a mile less per hour, or even a foot less, then the earth would wind up around the sun as a dog gets wound up with his chain around a tree.
Our orbital velocity is seven hundred thousand kilometers per second! "We're moving along at about a fifth of the speed of light!" "Are we safe in this orbit?" Fuller asked. "Safe enough," said Arcot bitterly. "So damned safe that I don't see how we'll ever break free. We can't pull away with all the power on this ship. We're trapped!
They were flying at a height of forty miles that they might have enough air and still not be too greatly hindered by air resistance. The black sky above them was spotted with points of glowing light, the blazing stars of space. But as they flew along, the sensation of weight was lost; they had reached orbital speed, and as the car steadily increased its velocity, there came a strange sensation!
Mars is not only nearer to us than any other planet, but it is so placed that it receives the light of the sun under favourable conditions for our vision. Moreover, its sky appears to be generally almost cloudless, so that when in its orbital course the sphere is nearest our earth it is under favourable conditions for telescopic observation.
In making this estimation, the water is supposed to stand on a level with the orbital plate of the frontal, with the deepest notch in the squamous margin of the parietal, and with the superior semicircular ridges of the occipital. Estimated in dried millet-seed, the contents equalled 31 ounces, Prussian Apothecaries' weight.
"Have to make sure there isn't anyone near the ship when we blast off. The rocket exhaust is powerful enough to blow a man two hundred feet, to say nothing of burning him to death." "You mean, sir " began Tom, not daring to hope. "Of course, Corbett," smiled Strong. "Take your stations for blast-off. We raise ship as soon as we get orbital clearance from spaceport control!"
The Platform seemed to dwindle with startling suddenness. It seemed to rush away and become lost in the myriads of stars. The space tug accelerated at four gravities in the direction opposed to its orbital motion. As the acceleration built up, it dropped toward Earth and home like a tumbled stone. There was bright sunshine at the Shed, not a single cloud in all the sky.
The mean distance apart of the component stars, as now ascertained, is just twenty-two million miles, and their joint mass quadruples that of the sun. But these are minimum estimates. For if the orbital plane be inclined, much or little, to the line of sight, the dimensions and mass of the system should be proportionately increased. An analogous discovery was made by Miss Maury in 1889.
This was before tidal friction had begun its work of grinding down axial velocity and expanding orbital range. But the position was not one of stable equilibrium. The slightest inequality must have set on foot a series of uncompensated changes. If the moon had whirled the least iota faster than the earth spun she must have been precipitated upon it.
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