centrifugal force drives us away irresistibly."

These words were uttered in a tone that killed Ardan's last and fondest
hope.

* * * * *

The portion of the Moon they were now approaching was her northern
hemisphere, found usually in the lower part of lunar maps. The lens of a
telescope, as is well known, gives only the inverted image of the
object; therefore, when an upright image is required, an additional
glass must be used. But as every additional glass is an additional
obstruction to the light, the object glass of a Lunar telescope is
employed without a corrector; light is thereby saved, and in viewing the
Moon, as in viewing a map, it evidently makes very little difference
whether we see her inverted or not. Maps of the Moon therefore, being
drawn from the image formed by the telescope, show the north in the
lower part, and _vice versa_. Of this kind was the _Mappa
Selenographica_, by Beer and Maedler, so often previously alluded to and
now carefully consulted by Barbican. The northern hemisphere, towards
which they were now rapidly approaching, presented a strong contrast
with the southern, by its vast plains and great depressions, checkered
here and there by very remarkable isolated mountains.[A]

At midnight the Moon was full. This was the precise moment at which the
travellers would have landed had not that unlucky bolide drawn them off
the track. The Moon was therefore strictly up to time, arriving at the
instant rigidly determined by the Cambridge Observatory. She occupied
the exact point, to a mathematical nicety, where our 28th parallel
crossed the perigee. An observer posted in the bottom of the Columbiad
at Stony Hill, would have found himself at this moment precisely under
the Moon. The axis of the enormous gun, continued upwards vertically,
would have struck the orb of night exactly in her centre.

It is hardly necessary to tell our readers that, during this memorable
night of the 5th and 6th of December, the travellers had no desire to
close their eyes. Could they do so, even if they had desired? No! All
their faculties, thoughts, and desires, were concentrated in one single
word: "Look!" Representatives of the Earth, and of all humanity past and
present, they felt that it was with their eyes that the race of man
contemplated the lunar regions and penetrated the secrets of our
satellite! A certain indescribable emotion therefore, combined with an
undefined sense o