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Then through the lower port-light he made a very exact observation from the apparent immobility of the projectile. Then rising and wiping the perspiration from his brow, he put down some figures upon paper. Nicholl saw that the president wished to find out from the length of the terrestrial diameter the distance of the bullet from the earth. He looked at him anxiously.
"Unless," replied Nicholl, "the atmosphere should be condensed on the other side, as certain astronomers pretend." "That is a consideration," answered Michel simply. In the meantime breakfast was concluded, and the observers resumed their posts. They tried to see through the dark port-light by putting out all light in the projectile. But not one luminous atom penetrated the obscurity.
The formula which had established them could not be mistrusted, and, when verified, the initial velocity of 16,576 metres, necessary for attaining the neutral point, was found quite right. The three friends looked at one another in silence. No one thought about breakfast after that. Barbicane, with set teeth, contracted brow, and fists convulsively closed, looked through the port-light.
If anything had happened to the port-light of that ship, we could have stationed him forward in the bows with his face looming over the rail and been well within the maritime regulations his face had a brilliancy which even the darkness of the night could not dim; and if the other light had gone out of commission, we could have impressed the aid of the bilious Armenian lady who was sick every minute and very sick for some minutes, for she was always of a glassy green color.
Barbicane's advice was followed. Nicholl threw the instrument out of the rapidly-opened port-light, holding it by a very short cord, so that it could be rapidly drawn in. The window was only open one second, and yet that one second was enough to allow the interior of the projectile to become frightfully cold. "Mille diables!" cried Michel Ardan, "it is cold enough here to freeze white bears!"
"Because we ought to have filled the projectile with useful objects, books, instruments, tools, &c. We could have thrown them all out, and they would all have followed in our wake! But, now I think of it, why can't we take a walk outside this? Why can't we go into space through the port-light?
About five o'clock Michel distributed to them, by way of dinner, some morsels of bread and cold meat, which were rapidly absorbed, whilst no one thought of leaving the port-light, the panes of which were becoming incrusted under the condensation of vapour.
"How shall we manage it?" asked Nicholl. "Nothing is easier," answered Michel Ardan, who was never at a loss. "Open the port-light rapidly, throw out the instrument; it will follow the projectile with exemplary docility; a quarter of an hour after take it in." "With your hand?" asked Barbicane. "With my hand," answered Michel.
He led me clean through the port-light of his cave, and down a length of steps outside to his yard on the foreshore of the Thames, where, among his barges hauled up for repairs, he paused by a formless shape covered by tarpaulins. "I've seen a few things in the way of boats, but this 'ere's a well, what do you make of it?"
They had only been five hours and forty minutes more than half the time assigned for the accomplishment of their journey, but they had come more than seven-tenths of the distance. This peculiarity was due to their regularly-decreasing speed. When they looked at the earth through the port-light at the bottom, it only looked like a black spot drowned in the sun's rays.