An Unknown World

by Pierre de Sélènes

  “This railway,” Merovar explained, “was constructed a long time ago specifically to facilitate the establishment of the cannon we used to send you the projectiles. Since you arrived among us, there has been no more reason to use it, and we hoped that we would not be obliged to have recourse to it so soon.”

  The Diemides had soon finished the preparations for the departure.

  The railway wagons, designed to operate in the void, different from those with which the voyagers were already familiar, being completely sealed and having solid frames in order to resist the pressure of the air that had to be accumulated within them. In one of them there was an apparatus for generating breathable air chemically, which rapidly furnished an atmosphere in which the voyagers could live as easily as inside the laboratory itself. Elegant tables and comfortable chairs were disposed in the other vehicles, the lateral walls of which were fitted with thick glass that permitted all the details of the region through which it was traveling to be seen.

  Rugel and his companions went into one of them, closing the door firmly, and as soon as the barometer indicated a sufficient atmospheric pressure, they took off the somewhat inconvenient special costumes in which they had been forced to dress.

  Meanwhile, the Diemides responsible for that task had activated the electric motors and soon, the gyroscopic apparatus having achieved the normal speed of rotation, the train moved off and slid rapidly along the rail.

  Comfortably seated in the large wagon, which moved without shaking and soundlessly, into which the light flooded, the three inhabitants of Earth thought they were dreaming. Traveling by railway over the surface of the moon was enough to trouble less well-equilibrated brains, and Lord Rodilan was surprised to find himself pinching his arm, as if to assure himself that he was really awake.

  But it was not a dream, and the marvelous spectacle that unfolded before their eyes was quite real.

  After following the sinuosities of the gorge for some time, between two harsh rocky slopes, the train entered an open region in which the gaze embraced a vast horizon. To their right they perceived the crater at whose summit the observatory stood, its crystal vaults and gigantic telescopes resplendent in the ardent sunlight. Seen from that distance, from which one could no longer distinguish the asperities of the rocks, it was an imposing mass crowned by a magnificent flamboyance.

  In the distance, to the left, they perceived mountain chains whose jagged crests stood out sharply and clearly against the raw blackness of the sky, and that trenchant opposition of colors, to which no vapor lent the slightest transition, seemed magical in its effect.

  Suddenly, the ground seemed to collapse and the train appeared to be moving through the void.

  “What’s that?” said Marcel, instinctively throwing himself backwards.

  “Oh, that’s a bridge,” said Rugel, smiling.

  Jacques and Lord Rodilan had stood up; their faces were slightly pale. Beneath them, an abyss was hollowed out whose bottom was lost in dense obscurity. The impression they could not help feeling, suspended on a thread that they could not see, reminded them of what they had experienced at the moment when, enclosed in the shell and reaching the surface of the moon, they had plunged into the bowels of the satellite, from which they had thought that they would never be able to emerge.

  But their souls were valiant; they pulled themselves together promptly. Already the crevasse had been crossed and the track, describing a tight curve, soon allowed them to look back and that surprising edifice, which was now displayed at an angle to the wagon. There was nothing bolder and more unexpected than that audacious construction: a simple ribbon of steel resting on an immense arc of the same metal, spanning at least four hundred meters, embedded at its two extremities directly in the rock—that was all.

  Marcel’s imagination would never have dared to conceive anything similar.

  “Damn!” he said. “Rugel, my friend, your engineers are fine fellows. That leaves far behind anything that their colleagues on Earth could contrive.”

  “Oh,” said Merovar, charmed by the young man’s astonishment, “there’s nothing very extraordinary about it; that bridge, bold as it might appear, is nevertheless perfectly solid.”

  The train continued its rapid progress, but less than an hour later it began to slow down.

  “We’re nearly there,” said Rugel. “It’s time to put on our costumes. The place to which we’re going is close by.”

  The train stopped without any jolt and the passengers got out.

  They found themselves next to a massive building of considerable dimensions, into which they penetrated via an airlock similar to the one that connected the observatory to the outside. It was illuminated by large bay windows, hermetically sealed, and inside, they saw apparatus for manufacturing artificial air as well as machines and tools of all kinds.

  “This is where the people employed here lived throughout the time the work lasted,” said Merovar.

  The travelers continued walking, and after half an hour they reached the objective of their excursion. The orifice of the cannon opened in front of them.

  A shaft 2.54 meters in diameter had been hollowed out vertically in the rock to a depth of seventy meters. Its walls were lined with a metal alloy, a kind of highly resistant bronze, some eighty centimeters thick, which left the cannon a barrel of 94 centimeters. That was the instrument with the aid of which the inhabitants of the Moon had, on numerous occasions, sent messages to the Earth, the last of which, by such a fortunate stroke of luck, had fallen into Marcel’s hands.

  Merovar explained to them that they had been obliged to choose a location for its installation some distanced away from the observatory—eighteen leagues in a straight line—to avoid the vibrations imparted to the ground by the explosions compromising the stability of the monument and the precision of the instruments of observation it contained.

  “It’s a great pity,” said Lord Rodilan, “that this cannon is too small for us to use; otherwise we’d be able to fix the date of our departure now.”

  “You’re very eager to leave us, friend,” said Rugel—and something akin to a reproachful sadness was detectable in his voice.

  The Englishman understood that he had caused needless offense to that generous individual, and added: “No, but since it’s necessary to separate, I think that sooner would be better, because, for you as for us, waiting becomes more painful as it’s prolonged. You know that we love you and will never forget you.”

  “I do know that, indeed—but we’ll be forced to wait. We need to establish a new cannon, capable of launching a projectile similar to the one that brought you here. That will be a long and difficult operation. I don’t doubt that the Head of State, the prudent Aldeovaze, in spite of his desire to keep you among us, will authorize the enterprise and do everything possible to facilitate its realization. Nevertheless, our task would be made much easier if we could find, in the region where we are at present, a crater of restricted dimensions hollowed out in the right direction, which could be adapted in such a fashion as to serve as a receptacle for our canon. Experience has demonstrated to us, in fact, that the material obstructing the chimneys of craters only forms a layer, of varying but never very considerable thickness, and that when one has traversed it one finds empty space beneath. We’d thus have a shaft already hollowed out, and it would be sufficient to even out its walls.”

  At that moment, one of the Diemides who was standing behind Rugel came forward. “Master,” he said, “I believe that I know of a crater not far from here that combines all the features you desire. I was among those who were employed in sending the latest message addressed to the Earth, and I’ve had the opportunity to explore the whole region. If you care to follow me, I’ll take you to it.”

  “Let’s go,” said Rugel.

  They resumed marching, and in less than an hour they arrived at the foot of a kind of truncated cone that only rose to a modest height above the ground. They climbed its slope and found themselves on the edge
of one of the smallest craters on the lunar surface. Merovar and Rugel examined the location attentively, measured the diameter of the interior orifice, and confirmed that it combined all the conditions desirable for the planned installation.

  “Well,” said Rugel, in conclusion, “It’s decided, then. This is where you’ll depart from when the moment comes for you to leave us. And you can be sure that, although I shall be sorry to arrive at the moment of our separation, far from doing anything to delay it, I’ll do everything I can to make sure that the work proceeds as rapidly as possible.”

  They went back in all haste to the place where the train had stopped. They all took their places in the wagons again, and were soon back in the observatory.

  IX. The Invisible Surface

  On returning to the lunar world, Rugel, accompanied by his three friends, went directly to see the Head of State and gave him an account of what had just occurred. Although the news of the intention of Marcel, Jacques and Lord Rodilan to return to Earth affected him painfully, he had too much intelligence not to comprehend their desire to see their fatherland again, and too noble a soul to oppose it.

  The labor necessary to ensure their return was, therefore, begun without delay. In spite of the diligence with which the task was undertaken, however, it would take some seven or eight months, and that long delay weighed upon the impatience of the three voyagers.

  The communications established with the Earth continued in a regular fashion every month, during the relatively brief intervals during which observation was possible, but the rarity of those intervals inevitably rendered exchanges of idea between the two worlds very slow. Mathieu-Rollère, whose curiosity had been greatly excited by the indication furnished in the early days of the existence of a human race living inside the Moon, multiplied his questions, to which Merovar replied in an unalterably obliging fashion. Things did not go quickly, however, and even though precious information had already been transmitted, it was obvious that a long time would go by before the inhabitants of the Earth had any definitive notion of the nature and condition of their lunar siblings.

  From the beginning, Marcel and his two companions had followed the exchange of communications with interest, but the occupation soon became impotent to satisfy them. They frequently went to the place where, under the guidance of experienced scientists, the Diemides were adapting the crater that was to serve as a mold for the liberating cannon. But there too, in spite of all the activity deployed, progress was slow; the difficulties to be overcome were considerable, and their fever, further aggravated every day by the waiting, rendered any delay unbearable.

  It was then that Marcel thought about undertaking a voyage of exploration intended, in his mind, to complete his study of the new world that he was to reveal to the Earth. He had, of course, had before his eyes the maps drawn up by lunar scientists of the mysterious part of the satellite that was eternally hidden from the curiosity of terrestrial observers; he had been able to see that it was almost entirely similar to the visible part: just as arid, similarly bristling with mountains and strewn with numerable craters. He knew that only the imagination of a few dreamers had been able to suppose the presence there of immense seas, profound forests, rapid rivers and, in sum, an entire life: a hypothesis in absolute contradiction to the general law presiding over the evolution of worlds. He wanted to make sure of it himself, though, and bring to those he counted on rejoining soon the testimony of his own experience. He wanted to be able to say: “I’ve seen it.”

  Jacques and Lord Rodilan welcomed the proposal; it responded to their secret desires, by giving satisfaction to the purposeless agitation that prevented them from holding still.

  They mentioned it to Rugel, who was entirely ready to assist them in the enterprise, and even offered to go with them.

  “It’s a bold plan,” he said, “worthy of your courage; and since you’re determined to carry it out, perhaps we can investigate an important question that has preoccupied me for a long time, and which I’d be very glad to be able to settle. If old traditions conserved in our histories can be trusted, there is, a long way to the east, a vast depression of considerable depth. Our scientists have often wondered whether a certain quantity of the atmosphere that once surrounded the planet might remain therein, and that it might have been able to support a residue of vegetable life. It’s a matter I’ve often thought of clarifying, but I’ve never had an opportunity.”

  Those words provoked a great enthusiasm in Marcel. “Ah!” he exclaimed. “Some terrestrial astronomers have thought that they perceived light vapors and variations in hue in the depths of certain craters, which they attributed to the presence of highly rarefied air, capable nevertheless of maintaining traces of vegetation. People refused to believe them. What a glory it would be for us to bring back evident proof that they weren’t mistaken!”

  Marcel’s enthusiasm infected Jacques, and even Lord Rodilan, in spite of his lack of interest in purely scientific questions, seemed full of ardor.

  Although they had become increasingly rare as life was concentrated in the bosom of the planet, the inhabitants of the Moon still carried out a few explorations of that nature, and the employment of all the machines necessary to their execution was familiar to them. Light and portable apparatus designed to manufacture air chemically, and powerful accumulators capable of storing electricity at high tension and furnishing sufficient lighting during the long lunar nights, were kept in a permanent state of readiness, at the disposal of those whose love of science prompted them to venture on to the uninhabitable surface.

  The greatest difficulty with which explorers who undertook voyages of long duration would have to content was the considerable drop in temperature during periods of darkness. The ingenuity of the scientists had made provision for that. Before putting on their impermeable vestments, the voyagers covered their bodies with a kind of coat of mail formed by a light and flexible metallic mesh that allowed the limbs complete freedom of movement. Beneath the reservoir of air that they wore on their backs there was a small but powerful electrical accumulator, connected by wires to the metallic mesh, which caused a current to circulate therein of sufficient intensity to maintain the body and the surrounding air at a consistently tolerable temperature.

  As for the necessity that the three inhabitants of Earth had to replenish their strength by nourishment, provision could easily be made for that. Inside the sphere that covered their head a small metallic receptacle was placed filled with the mysterious liquid that had constituted their principal aliment for some time, to the despair of Lord Rodilan. A tube departing from that receptacle was fixed to the sphere in such a way as to be within easy range of their lips. A slight movement permitted them to grasp it and suck in the chemical elements sufficient to nourish them.

  As the observatory was thirty degrees—which is to say, more than nine hundred kilometers—from the region invisible from the Earth, Rugel had judged that the distance in question could be crossed during a single lunar night of fourteen terrestrial days, and that they could reach the other hemisphere at daybreak. It would be interesting for Marcel and his companions to be able to travel over the part of the satellite’s surface with which they wanted to acquaint themselves in daylight.

  In consequence, they left the observatory on 1 June, as darkness was beginning to envelop it. In addition to Marcel, Jacques, Lord Rodilan and Rugel, the little caravan included sixty Diemides. Ten scouts marched ahead, carrying powerful electric lamps, whose rays illuminated the whole area around them and permitted them to distinguish all the features of the landscape through which they were traveling for several kilometers around. The three voyagers and their guide advanced in the center, and the remainder of the Diemides brought up the rear, carrying, as well as numerous scientific instruments, the apparatus that manufactured and stored the air necessary for respiration. The alternations of marching and resting had been regulated in advance in such a way as to save the strength of the voyagers.

  It is necess
ary not to forget, moreover, that the force of gravity on the surface of the Moon is much less than on Earth, so they hardly felt the weight of the vestments that they were wearing and the apparatus they were carrying. They were capable of crossing distance, without fatigue, that would have surpassed the limits of human strength on our world.

  They felt light and carefree, full of ardor.

  The first days of the journey were free of incident; they traversed the vast plain at the center of which Hansteen crater was located, heading eastwards with a slight inclination southwards.

  Examination of the detailed maps with which they were equipped had informed them of the presence of deep fissures, one situated in the vicinity of the crater Grimaldi, the other a little further on, both of which were uncrossable.

  As they approached the hills forming the eastern edge of the Ocean of Storms, the ground rose up noticeably, and they soon found themselves on the continent not far from the crater Sirsalis. There they were delayed somewhat by the necessity of climbing the buttresses of the crater, a mass of sheer rocks through which they could only advance with great precaution, in spite of the light projected by their electric lamps. Rugel had taken care to attach to each of his three friends two young Diemides with special responsibility for helping them in difficult passages. Proud of that task, which they considered a mark of honor, they did their very best to support those confided to them, and on more than one occasion, without their aid, a dangerous fall might have cut the journey shot for one of the bold explorers.

  When that obstacle had been overcome, they found themselves on the plain again, and, still heading south-eastwards, passed at an equal distance between the craters Cruger and Asaph Hall.26

  From that point on, the voyagers, still guided by Rugel, headed more directly eastwards, advancing without too much difficulty until they arrived in the foothills of the Cordilleras, a mountain chain whose mean elevation was nearly four thousand meters. There was no possibility of tackling that formidable granite wall head on. Fortunately, the Diemides forming the advance guard knew the region well, having traveled it before. They knew that in the vicinity of the southern extremity of the crater Troubelot the chain was interrupted, and that there was a narrow but easily practicable pass through the mountainous masses. They set forth into it with confidence, therefore.