by Jules Verne
CHAPTER XXI
J. T. MASTON RECALLED
"It is `they' come back again!" the young midshipman had said,and every one had understood him. No one doubted but that themeteor was the projectile of the Gun Club. As to the travelerswhich it enclosed, opinions were divided regarding their fate.
"They are dead!" said one.
"They are alive!" said another; "the crater is deep, and theshock was deadened."
"But they must have wanted air," continued a third speaker;"they must have died of suffocation."
"Burned!" replied a fourth; "the projectile was nothing but anincandescent mass as it crossed the atmosphere."
"What does it matter!" they exclaimed unanimously; "living ordead, we must pull them out!"
But Captain Blomsberry had assembled his officers, and "withtheir permission," was holding a council. They must decide uponsomething to be done immediately. The more hasty ones were forfishing up the projectile. A difficult operation, though not animpossible one. But the corvette had no proper machinery, whichmust be both fixed and powerful; so it was resolved that theyshould put in at the nearest port, and give information to theGun Club of the projectile's fall.
This determination was unanimous. The choice of the port hadto be discussed. The neighboring coast had no anchorage on27@ latitude. Higher up, above the peninsula of Monterey, standsthe important town from which it takes its name; but, seated onthe borders of a perfect desert, it was not connected with theinterior by a network of telegraphic wires, and electricityalone could spread these important news fast enough.
Some degrees above opened the bay of San Francisco. Through thecapital of the gold country communication would be easy with theheart of the Union. And in less than two days the Susquehanna,by putting on high pressure, could arrive in that port. She musttherefore start at once.
The fires were made up; they could set off immediately.Two thousand fathoms of line were still out, which CaptainBlomsberry, not wishing to lose precious time in hauling in,resolved to cut.
"we will fasten the end to a buoy," said he, "and that buoy willshow us the exact spot where the projectile fell."
"Besides," replied Lieutenant Bronsfield, "we have our situationexact-- 27@ 7' north latitude and 41@ 37' west longitude."
"Well, Mr. Bronsfield," replied the captain, "now, with yourpermission, we will have the line cut."
A strong buoy, strengthened by a couple of spars, was throwninto the ocean. The end of the rope was carefully lashed to it;and, left solely to the rise and fall of the billows, the buoywould not sensibly deviate from the spot.
At this moment the engineer sent to inform the captain thatsteam was up and they could start, for which agreeablecommunication the captain thanked him. The course was thengiven north-northeast, and the corvette, wearing, steered atfull steam direct for San Francisco. It was three in the morning.
Four hundred and fifty miles to cross; it was nothing for a goodvessel like the Susquehanna. In thirty-six hours she had coveredthat distance; and on the 14th of December, at twenty-sevenminutes past one at night, she entered the bay of San Francisco.
At the sight of a ship of the national navy arriving at full speed,with her bowsprit broken, public curiosity was greatly roused.A dense crowd soon assembled on the quay, waiting for themto disembark.
After casting anchor, Captain Blomsberry and LieutenantBronsfield entered an eight-pared cutter, which soon broughtthem to land.
They jumped on to the quay.
"The telegraph?" they asked, without answering one of thethousand questions addressed to them.
The officer of the port conducted them to the telegraph officethrough a concourse of spectators. Blomsberry and Bronsfieldentered, while the crowd crushed each other at the door.
Some minutes later a fourfold telegram was sent out--the firstto the Naval Secretary at Washington; the second to thevice-president of the Gun Club, Baltimore; the third to the Hon.J. T. Maston, Long's Peak, Rocky Mountains; and the fourth tothe sub-director of the Cambridge Observatory, Massachusetts.
It was worded as follows:
In 20@ 7' north latitude, and 41@ 37' west longitude, on the12th 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 learnedthe news. Before six in the evening the different States of theUnion had heard the great catastrophe; and after midnight, bythe cable, the whole of Europe knew the result of the greatAmerican experiment. We will not attempt to picture the effectproduced on the entire world by that unexpected denouement.
On receipt of the telegram the Naval Secretary telegraphed tothe Susquehanna to wait in the bay of San Francisco withoutextinguishing her fires. Day and night she must be readyto put to sea.
The Cambridge observatory called a special meeting; and, withthat composure which distinguishes learned bodies in general,peacefully discussed the scientific bearings of the question.At the Gun Club there was an explosion. All the gunnerswere assembled. Vice-President the Hon. Wilcome was in theact of reading the premature dispatch, in which J. T. Mastonand Belfast announced that the projectile had just been seen inthe gigantic reflector of Long's Peak, and also that it was heldby lunar attraction, and was playing the part of under satelliteto the lunar world.
We know the truth on that point.
But on the arrival of Blomsberry's dispatch, so decidelycontradicting J. T. Maston's telegram, two parties were formedin the bosom of the Gun Club. On one side were those whoadmitted the fall of the projectile, and consequently the returnof the travelers; on the other, those who believed in theobservations of Long's Peak, concluded that the commander of theSusquehanna had made a mistake. To the latter the pretendedprojectile was nothing but a meteor! nothing but a meteor, ashooting globe, which in its fall had smashed the bows ofthe corvette. It was difficult to answer this argument, forthe speed with which it was animated must have made observationvery difficult. The commander of the Susquehanna and herofficers might have made a mistake in all good faith; one argumenthowever, was in their favor, namely, that if the projectile hadfallen on the earth, its place of meeting with the terrestrialglobe could only take place on this 27@ north latitude, and(taking into consideration the time that had elapsed, and therotary motion of the earth) between the 41@ and the 42@ ofwest longitude. In any case, it was decided in the Gun Clubthat Blomsberry brothers, Bilsby, and Major Elphinstone shouldgo straight to San Francisco, and consult as to the means ofraising the projectile from the depths of the ocean.
These devoted men set off at once; and the railroad, which willsoon cross the whole of Central America, took them as far as St.Louis, where the swift mail-coaches awaited them. Almost at thesame moment in which the Secretary of Marine, the vice-presidentof the Gun Club, and the sub-director of the Observatory receivedthe dispatch from San Francisco, the Honorable J. T. Maston wasundergoing the greatest excitement he had ever experienced in hislife, an excitement which even the bursting of his pet gun, whichhad more than once nearly cost him his life, had not caused him.We may remember that the secretary of the Gun Club had startedsoon after the projectile (and almost as quickly) for the stationon Long's Peak, in the Rocky Mountains, J. Belfast, director of theCambridge Observatory, accompanying him. Arrived there, the twofriends had installed themselves at once, never quitting thesummit of their enormous telescope. We know that this giganticinstrument had been set up according to the reflecting system,called by the English "front view." This arrangement subjectedall objects to but one reflection, making the view consequentlymuch clearer; the result was that, when they were takingobservation, J. T. Maston and Belfast were placed in the _upper_part of the instrument and not in the lower, which they reachedby a circular staircase, a masterpiece of lightness, while belowthem opened a metal well terminated by the metallic mirror,which measured two hundred and eighty feet in depth.
It was on a
narrow platform placed above the telescope that thetwo savants passed their existence, execrating the day which hidthe moon from their eyes, and the clouds which obstinatelyveiled her during the night.
What, then, was their delight when, after some days of waiting,on the night of the 5th of December, they saw the vehicle whichwas bearing their friends into space! To this delight succeededa great deception, when, trusting to a cursory observation, theylaunched their first telegram to the world, erroneouslyaffirming that the projectile had become a satellite of themoon, gravitating in an immutable orbit.
From that moment it had never shown itself to their eyes-- adisappearance all the more easily explained, as it was thenpassing behind the moon's invisible disc; but when it was timefor it to reappear on the visible disc, one may imagine theimpatience of the fuming J. T. Maston and his not lessimpatient companion. Each minute of the night they thoughtthey saw the projectile once more, and they did not see it.Hence constant discussions and violent disputes between them,Belfast affirming that the projectile could not be seen, J. T.Maston maintaining that "it had put his eyes out."
"It is the projectile!" repeated J. T. Maston.
"No," answered Belfast; "it is an avalanche detached from alunar mountain."
"Well, we shall see it to-morrow."
"No, we shall not see it any more. It is carried into space."
"Yes!"
"No!"
And at these moments, when contradictions rained like hail, thewell-known irritability of the secretary of the Gun Clubconstituted a permanent danger for the Honorable Belfast.The existence of these two together would soon have becomeimpossible; but an unforseen event cut short theireverlasting discussions.
During the night, from the 14th to the 15th of December, the twoirreconcilable friends were busy observing the lunar disc, J. T.Maston abusing the learned Belfast as usual, who was by hisside; the secretary of the Gun Club maintaining for thethousandth time that he had just seen the projectile, and addingthat he could see Michel Ardan's face looking through one of thescuttles, at the same time enforcing his argument by a series ofgestures which his formidable hook rendered very unpleasant.
At this moment Belfast's servant appeared on the platform (itwas ten at night) and gave him a dispatch. It was the commanderof the Susquehanna's telegram.
Belfast tore the envelope and read, and uttered a cry.
"What!" said J. T. Maston.
"The projectile!"
"Well!"
"Has fallen to the earth!"
Another cry, this time a perfect howl, answered him. He turnedtoward J. T. Maston. The unfortunate man, imprudently leaningover the metal tube, had disappeared in the immense telescope.A fall of two hundred and eighty feet! Belfast, dismayed,rushed to the orifice of the reflector.
He breathed. J. T. Maston, caught by his metal hook, washolding on by one of the rings which bound the telescopetogether, uttering fearful cries.
Belfast called. Help was brought, tackle was let down, and theyhoisted up, not without some trouble, the imprudent secretary ofthe Gun Club.
He reappeared at the upper orifice without hurt.
"Ah!" said he, "if I had broken the mirror?"
"You would have paid for it," replied Belfast severely.
"And that cursed projectile has fallen?" asked J. T. Maston.
"Into the Pacific!"
"Let us go!"
A quarter of an hour after the two savants were descending thedeclivity of the Rocky Mountains; and two days after, at thesame time as their friends of the Gun Club, they arrived at SanFrancisco, having killed five horses on the road.
Elphinstone, the brothers Blomsberry, and Bilsby rushed towardthem on their arrival.
"What shall we do?" they exclaimed.
"Fish up the projectile," replied J. T. Maston, "and the soonerthe better."