ific, on December 12th, at 1.17 am. Send
instructions.--BLOMSBERRY, Commander Susquehanna."

Five minutes afterwards the whole town of San Francisco knew the
tidings. Before 6 p.m. the different States of the Union had
intelligence of the supreme catastrophe. After midnight, through the
cable, the whole of Europe knew the result of the great American
enterprise.

It would be impossible to describe the effect produced throughout the
world by the unexpected news.

On receipt of the telegram the Secretary of the Navy telegraphed to the
Susquehanna to keep under fire, and wait in the bay of San Francisco.
She was to be ready to set sail day or night.

The Observatory of Cambridge had an extraordinary meeting, and, with the
serenity which distinguishes scientific bodies, it peacefully discussed
the scientific part of the question.

At the Gun Club there was an explosion. All the artillerymen were
assembled. The Vice-President, the Honourable Wilcome, was just reading
the premature telegram by which Messrs. Maston and Belfast announced
that the projectile had just been perceived in the gigantic reflector of
Long's Peak. This communication informed them also that the bullet,
retained by the attraction of the moon, was playing the part of
sub-satellite in the solar world.

The truth on this subject is now known.

However, upon the arrival of Blomsberry's message, which so formally
contradicted J.T. Maston's telegram, two parties were formed in the
bosom of the Gun Club. On the one side were members who admitted the
fall of the projectile, and consequently the return of the travellers.
On the other were those who, holding by the observations at Long's Peak,
concluded that the commander of the Susquehanna was mistaken. According
to the latter, the pretended projectile was only a bolis, nothing but a
bolis, a shooting star, which in its fall had fractured the corvette.
Their argument could not very well be answered, because the velocity
with which it was endowed had made its observation very difficult. The
commander of the Susquehanna and his officers might certainly have been
mistaken in good faith. One argument certainly was in their favour: if
the projectile had fallen on the earth it must have touched the
terrestrial spheroid upon the 27th degree of north latitude, and, taking
into account the time that had elapsed, and the earth's movement of
rotation, between the 41st and 42nd degree of west longitude.

However tha