the time employed in going over the
distance between the neutral point and the South Pole must be equal to
the distance which separates the South Pole from the neutral point. The
hours representing the time it took were carefully noted down, and the
calculation became easy.

Barbicane found that this point would be reached by the projectile at 1
a.m. on the 8th of December. It was then 3 a.m. on the 7th of December.
Therefore, if nothing intervened, the projectile would reach the neutral
point in twenty-two hours.

The rockets had been put in their places to slacken the fall of the
bullet upon the moon, and now the bold fellows were going to use them to
provoke an exactly contrary effect. However that may be, they were
ready, and there was nothing to do but await the moment for setting fire
to them.

"As there is nothing to do," said Nicholl, "I have a proposition to
make."

"What is that?" asked Barbicane.

"I propose we go to sleep."

"That is a nice idea!" exclaimed Michel Ardan.

"It is forty hours since we have closed our eyes," said Nicholl. "A few
hours' sleep would set us up again."

"Never!" replied Michel.

"Good," said Nicholl; "every man to his humour--mine is to sleep."

And lying down on a divan, Nicholl was soon snoring like a forty-eight
pound bullet.

"Nicholl is a sensible man," said Barbicane soon. "I shall imitate him."

A few minutes after he was joining his bass to the captain's baritone.

"Decidedly," said Michel Ardan, when he found himself alone, "these
practical people sometimes do have opportune ideas."

And stretching out his long legs, and folding his long arms under his
head, Michel went to sleep too.

But this slumber could neither be durable nor peaceful. Too many
preoccupations filled the minds of these three men, and a few hours
after, at about 7 a.m., they all three awoke at once.

The projectile was still moving away from the moon, inclining its
conical summit more and more towards her. This phenomenon was
inexplicable at present, but it fortunately aided the designs of
Barbicane.

Another seventeen hours and the time for action would have come.

That day seemed long. However bold they might be, the travellers felt
much anxiety at the approach of the minute that was to decide
everything, either their fall upon the moon or their imprisonment in an
immutable orbit. They therefore counted the hours, which went too slowly
for them, Barbicane and Nicholl obstinatel